CENTRAL — A suspicious ticking package caused a scare at the Central Post Office last Thursday.
According to reports from the Central Police Department, officers were dispatched around 8:55 a.m. to the post office, located at 1205 West Main Street, about a suspicious package.
Once on the scene, officers were told the package was outside in the rear of the post office. Officers were told by postal employees that the package was emitting an audible ticking sound and seemed to weigh about one pound, wrapped in normal post office packaging, according to the report.
Following standard procedures to ensure the personal safety and proper investigation of the package, the office immediately contacted Central Police Chief Kerry Avery. The entire area around the post office was secured and the Central Fire Department was called to assist. The Anderson County Bomb squad was also called to assist.
After a complete investigation, the package was deemed no threat. According to officials, the package contained a clock.
A follow-up investigation is planned by the United States Postal Inspector concerning the package recipients.

COUNTY — Music of the Southern Appalachian Mountains and stories of Upcountry South Carolina will be featured in a series of entertaining ‘down home’ sessions to help support the Young Appalachian Musician program. On Saturday, January 29, Betty and Ed McDaniel will welcome the community to their 140-year-old Pickens County farmhouse for an afternoon and evening of traditional music, storytelling, home baked goodies and visiting with friends around the fireplace.
Musical roots run deep here. Papa Roy Lewis, the late patriarch of the ever popular Lewis Family, hails from these hills. Long considered the “icon of Bluegrass Gospel Music,” The Lewis Family began their celebrated career in gospel music in the early 1950s.
Their weekly Sunday afternoon show appeared on WJBF-TV in Augusta, Ga., for 38 years. They were inducted into the Gospel Music Hall of Fame (2005) and the International Bluegrass Music Association’s Hall of Honor in Nashville (2006). The group retired in 2009 after performing together for more than a half century throughout the United States and Canada.
Papa Roy Lewis was only five years old when the family moved from Pickens to Lincolnton, Ga., in 1910. Ben McDaniel, Ed McDaniel’s granddaddy, married Rosa Lee Lewis, a cousin of Papa Roy.
“The homestead has been in the Lewis family since the early 1800s when Jacob Lewis settled here,” said McDaniel, husband of Betty McDaniel, YAM Executive Director.
“My brother and I bought the place in the ‘60s and renovated the house in 1978,” McDaniel said. “Prior to World War II the house served as a post office for the community and square dances were once held here.”
Some of the very best musicians in the Upcountry are also YAM instructors. Traditional music will be performed by these and others including SC Heritage Award Winner, Steve McGaha, Russ and Billie Jordan, and members of the performing YAM band, Sweet Potato Pie Kids. Those spinning yarns about mountain spirits, mountain creatures and other tales about life in the Southern Appalachian Mountains include renowned author Dot Jackson, award-winning outdoor writer and naturalist Dennis Chastain, and Nick Hallman, an extraordinary musician whose hilarious stories are brought to life through music.
Sessions will include 35 minutes of storytelling, 35 minutes of music, and of course, home-baked goodies. The 90-minute sessions are scheduled for Saturday, January 29 at 2 p.m., 3:30 p.m., and 5:00 p.m.
The McDaniel place is located at 792 Holly Springs School Road in Pickens.
To reserve a place in one of these sessions contact Ed or Betty McDaniel at 864.878-4257, or purchase a ticket from a YAM member school.
Donations of $10 or more are encouraged and all contributions will be used to support the Young Appalachian Musician program. For further information e-mail POSAM_Info@yahoo.com, or visit and join our YAM (Young Appalachian Musicians) page on Facebook.

CLEMSON — Clemson University’s Conference Center and Inn complex has a $14 million average annual impact on the local economy and maintains more than 345 jobs through operations and patron spending in South Carolina, according to a study.
The study, by the Regional Dynamics and Economic Modeling Laboratory at the Strom Thurmond Institute of Government and Public Affairs, looked at the economic impact the complex had on Pickens, Oconee, Anderson and Greenville counties each year from 2006 to 2010. It studied the impact of the operations of the Madren Center, Walker Golf Course and Martin Inn, as well as the impact of dollars spent by visitors to the complex.
The $14 million includes the direct, indirect and induced impacts of the Conference Center and Inn. Direct impact includes the jobs and incomes of Conference Center and Inn employees and purchases of goods and services from local suppliers. Indirect impact counts the jobs and incomes created by those suppliers. Induced impact is the increased economic activity in the local economy through consumer spending resulting from income generated by the Conference Center and Inn’s economic activity.
“Ripples in a pond is a good illustration to describe indirect and induced effects,” said Rob Carey, interim director of the Regional Dynamics and Economic Modeling Laboratory at the Strom Thurmond Institute. “Every time someone spends money at a business, then that business is able to turn around and spend money somewhere else, and so on.”

COUNTY — Many in Pickens County take a “believe it when I see it” approach to meteorologists’ snow forecasts each winter, as the area is not known for having substantial accumulation.
This winter, however, seems to be a whole different story.
A little more than two weeks after the county’s first documented White Christmas, winter storm warnings for Pickens County were accurate again earlier this week, and the area was blanketed in a deep snow that is likely to stick around throughout the week.
On Monday morning, residents throughout the county awoke to anywhere from seven to nine inches of snow accumulation. According to the National Weather Service (NWS) at the Greenville-Spartanburg Airport, storm spotters reported a nine-inch snowfall in Dacusville, a seven-inch snowfall in Pickens and an estimated seven- to eight-inch snowfall in Easley.
Reports from the NWS document that the last storm of this magnitude occurred in January 1993 with Greenville-Spartanburg areas receiving nine inches of snow accumulation.
South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford declared a State of Emergency due to the severe winter weather that has affected the entire state.
On Monday, the South Carolina Department of Emergency Management deployed 357 law enforcement personnel from the SC Highway Patrol (SCHP), SLED and the Department of Natural Resources to respond to incidents throughout the state. In addition, wrecker teams made up of 120 National Guard soldiers have been placed on active duty to assist local responders and state agencies in dealing with vehicle accidents and roadway clearings.
The School District of Pickens County closed schools on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday in response to the snow storm. Local government offices and various businesses were also closed because of the inclement weather.
Crews from the S.C. Department of Transportation have been working around the clock clearing roadways and attempting to make them safe for travel. Roadways in Pickens, Oconee and Greenville counties have been scoured with approximately 1,500 tons of salt, 1,000 gallons of calcium chloride and 63,000 gallons of salt. The DOT’s focus has been on major, heavily traveled roadways — such as I-85, I-385, U.S. 123 and U.S. 178 — so many back roads have received little or no attention at this point, rendering them the most dangerous to drive.
While no more precipitation is expected this week, the NWS is predicting that the snow on the ground is here to stay for a while. Arctic air moving into the area will keep temperatures approximately 15 degrees below what they would normally be at this time. Only minor amounts of snow will melt during the day as the temperature climbs into the mid 30’s; however, the snow melt presents more dangerous problems as nighttime temperatures in the teens will turn the melted snow into ice.
NWS forecasters predict that black ice and frozen road conditions will linger through at least the middle of the week in Northeast Georgia, the Upstate of South Carolina and much of the mountains and foothills of western North Carolina.
“It’s going to be a rough week ahead,” Pickens County Emergency Management Director Lynn Fisher said, as overnight temperatures are forecasted to drop into the teens by Thursday.
A winter weather advisory for black ice means that there is the possibility and potential for roads to refreeze rendering them extremely slippery. Anyone attempting to head out onto the roads should be extremely cautious. Even though roads may appear clear, it is possible that they are covered with a thin layer of transparent black ice. Bridges have a higher likelihood of freezing, because cold air is able to circulate underneath.
SCHP and SC DOT are asking citizens to stay off roads unless there is an extreme emergency or necessity.