Monthly Archives: October 2015
Lawrence Chapel UMC plans annual harvest fest
CENTRAL — Lawrence Chapel United Methodist Church will hold its annual harvest festival on Oct. 31, 4-7 p.m. The festival is a free community event.
There will be a trunk or treat, inflatables, games, soup and sandwiches.
Lawrence Chapel UMC is located at 2101 Six Mile Highway in Central. For more information, visit lawrencechapel.church.
CAST to hold monthly meeting October 27
CLEMSON — Clemson Area StoryTellers (CAST) Guild will hold its monthly meeting at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, Oct. 27, at The Arts Center at 212 Butler St. in Clemson.
Have stories to share? Come and tell them where you have a captive audience.
Everyone is invited to an evening of family friendly stories, poetry or music. Attend as a listener or a teller — all are welcome.
For more information, visit explorearts.org, call (864) 855-6396 or email clemsonareastorytellers@yahoo.com.
Faith Lutheran Chapel to host annual yard sale
PICKENS — The seventh annual yard sale of Faith Lutheran Chapel will be held [cointent_lockedcontent] Oct. 23-24 from 7 a..m. to 2 p.m. All proceeds from the sale will go to local charities.
Household items, clothing, craft items, books, furniture, holiday items and baked goods will be sold. Utilizing supplemental funds from Thrivent Financial, every dollar spent will provide $1.50 to the Gleaning House to purchase needed food for Pickens residents.
With a great many reasonably priced items and support from frugal area shoppers, the yard sale that began as a means of allowing a small, beginning church to help feed the hungry of Pickens now can financially help several other area groups.
The church is located at 729 W. Main St. across from Blue Ridge Co-op. [/cointent_lockedcontent]
Six Mile 8U teams to hold fundraiser
SIX MILE — Six Mile Recreation’s two 8-year-old and under baseball coaches pitch teams are having a breast cancer awareness game on Oct. 20 at 6 p.m. at Ponderosa Park in Six Mile.
Raffle tickets can be bought at the game or from one of the players on the two teams. Given away will be a signed pink baseball from Clemson baseball coach Monte Lee, a signed football from Clemson football coach Dabo Swinney, three 50-yard line tickets to the Clemson-Wake Forest football game, seven nights at the Blue Green Resort in Gatlinburg, Tenn., or Myrtle Beach and a Rawlings 11-inch black glove and a 20 oz. Easton Bat.
The teams also invite breast cancer survivors to attend the game so they can be recognized after the game.
All proceeds and donations will go to Dabo’s All In Foundation.
The two teams will be decked out in pink to support the fight against breast cancer.
puddles & pumpkins
Rocky Nimmons/Courier
Despite chilly, rainy weather, a large crowd still turned out as Pumpkintown hosted its 37th annual Pumpkin Festival on Saturday. 
The event acts as the unofficial kickoff to fall for many local residents, and this year was no exception, as the festival offered food and fun for all.
Soapstone to host meal fundraiser at church
PICKENS — Soapstone Church invites everyone to a special fundraiser at the church, located at 296 Liberia Road in Pickens, this Saturday, Oct. 17.
The event will feature fine cooking and will be held from noon-8 p.m.
Visitors will enjoy true Southern cooking, including a fish fry, barbecue and fried chicken with all the fixings right from Mrs. Mabel’s kitchen.
For more information, call (864) 414-8470.
YMCA, SDPC to mentor area students
EASLEY — The School District of Pickens County and the Pickens County YMCA are calling for volunteers to mentor children at Easley schools.
“This is a tremendous opportunity for our community to have a significant impact in our schools,” said Sid Collins, CEO of the Pickens County YMCA. “The teachers and principals work tirelessly to educate and guide today’s youth. This program allows for parents, churches, businesses and leaders in our community to give back in a way that is significant. All it takes is time, the one thing our children desperately need from us.”
The YMCA is seeking mentors willing to commit 30 minutes a week for a full school year. Mentors will be recruited, approved, and trained by the YMCA, while schools will select students for the program with parent permission. The YMCA and the school district will then work together to pair mentors with students.
“We want the mentorship program to help kids who are at-risk of not reaching their potential,” said Dr. Bill Roach, SDPC’s assistant superintendent of administration. “One of the things that we’ve determined will help these students is mentorship. Research shows that if a student can connect with at least one adult in the building they do better academically. We are excited to partner with the YMCA in this mentoring program to help these students reach their full potential.”
The YMCA will fully fund the program through contributions from the community, and will be holding mentor orientations and trainings throughout the year. The program will be limited to Easley-area schools for the 2015-2016 school year, with the goal of expanding it district-wide in years to come. “This program is modeled after the Mentor Upstate program which has a track record of success in other districts,” Collins said. “We believe life change happens through relationships where someone gives positive advice to another, and we’ve seen life change happen as a result of mentorship programs before.”
Those interested in becoming mentors should contact Cindy Perry, YMCA mentor director, by email at cindyperry@pcymca.net or by phone at (864) 307-0213.
Community prayer service scheduled
By Ben Robinson
Staff Reporter
brobinson@thepccourier.com
PICKENS — A community prayer service has been scheduled at Legacy Square the [cointent_lockedcontent] night of Oct. 20 at 6 p.m.
“There’s a group of us that’s been getting together the past few weeks, between law enforcement and several pastors of the community,” Marvin Short told Pickens City Council recently on behalf of Pickens United in Prayer.
“The idea behind it is that this would be a non-denominational prayer celebrating the good things about Pickens, because there’s a lot of good things about Pickens. We want the opportunity to be there and be all seen together, praying for Pickens.”
Short said the service is planned to last around an hour and feature prayer and singing, closed with a benediction.
“What we want to show to the community is that our strongest element in our community is our churches,” Short said. “And we’re hoping that all of our churches in the community — not just in the city of Pickens — can come together and be present.
Short said the service is for all churches in the Pickens area, not just Pickens city limits.
“We have reached out to a lot of the churches in the community,” Short said. “We’re hoping to reach out to even more. We have sort of identified our area as the Highway 183 corridor, the Highway 133 corridor and the Highway 11 corridor — that’s the Pickens area to us. We would appreciate the support of Pickens and its council.”
Short wanted no confusion about the purpose of the service.
“We’re looking to pray together and let everybody know how much we love our community,” Short said. “And most importantly, how we depend on our Lord Jesus Christ and what we need to do in our community.”
[/cointent_lockedcontent]
Ancient art of storytelling meets the dark side at Hagood Center on Friday
Kim Weitkamp
PICKENS — Nationally renowned storyteller, singer and songwriter Kim Weitkamp will take center stage at the Hagood Community Center in Pickens this week.
Weitkamp is currently on an East Coast tour and will be making a stop at the Hagood Center on Friday to thrill audiences with a blend of story, song and horror. Weitkamp will be performing original stories and songs from her latest award-winning album, “Head Bone Rattles,” which has seen airplay on various NPR affiliate stations and Sirius XM Radio.
Weitkamp has been telling and performing stories for more than 28 years but became a career storyteller 12 years ago. She has become one of the most recognized storytellers on the continent. She has won a mantel of awards for most of her recordings, as well as recognition for her work using story in “Peace Projects.” The last two years have seen a new development in her repertoire — ghost stories.
One reviewer wrote that an evening of ghostly tales with Weitkamp was like having dinner with Tim Burton, Dr. Seuss and Alfred Hitchcock. Although Weitkamp’s performance is not graphically violent, it is not recommended for children under 12. Most of her shows are for adult audiences and carry heavier themes.
“One of the most fulfilling things about being a storyteller is captivating a room of 500-plus people with words,” Weitkamp said. “The second most fulfilling thing is taking the listener on a journey to another dimension without them ever leaving their seat.”
Doors will open at 7 p.m., and the show will start at 7:30 p.m. on Friday. Coffee and dessert will be provided prior to the performance. Tickets are $6 in advance and $8 at the door. Contact the Hagood Center at (864) 878-6000 for more information. The Hagood Community Center is located at 129 School House St. in Pickens.
Sunset Post Office serving 110 years
SUNSET — Sunset post office clerk Melissa Link considers herself a bit of a “history geek,” so she was understandably excited when she found a treasure trove of old newspaper clippings and other items documenting the post office’s past earlier this year while cleaning out filing cabinets.
Left: Clerk Melissa Link is helping honor the Sunset post office’s 110th anniversary this year. Below: Pictured at longtime Sunset post office driver Cleo Chapman in 1991 are, from left, then-postmaster Edna Winchester Barton, former postmaster Essie Barton, driver Sonley Grant, Chapman and Chapman’s son, Eugene, who took over for her when she retired.
Courtesy photos
Upon her discovery of the items — which included an essay written by a former postmaster Edna Barton detailing the history of the office — Link realized this year is the 110th anniversary of the Sunset post office.
“Its history is of great importance historically,” Link said. “The Sunset post office has stood the test of time and is the only office to survive the combining of many small mountain town post offices during the horseback days — from being run out of the postmaster’s home to its current location.”
Now located at 7149 S.C. Highway 11, the Sunset post office was originally established on Dec. 4, 1905, in the home of William Walker Aiken near Antioch Baptist Church. Aiken ran the post office until 1918, when it was moved 800 yards northwest, to the home of A.T. and Flora Winchester. The Winchesters and their daughter ran the post office out of their home until Flora’s death in 1931. The post office then moved a little more than two miles northeast to the home of Essie Barton, directly across the street from the current post office.
Barton ran the post office out of her home until her retirement in 1968, when her daughter-in-law, Edna Winchester Barton, took over as postmaster and built the current post office adjacent to her home. Barton retired in 2001, handing the reins of the post office over to Joyce Heine-Dennis, who remained as postmaster until her 2012 retirement, when the U.S. Postal Service moved mail carriers to Pickens, eliminating the need for a postmaster at the Sunset post office.
“The history is technically complete with all five postmasters, which is amazing that the post office has only had five in its history,” Link said. “If you notice, from 1931-2001, (the post office) was run for 70 years by one family.”
Link, Sunset drivers and the couple who cleans the post office joined forces to create a banner honoring the post office’s history. In the retail lobby, Link created a display of all five former postmasters, with a history bulletin board for all the clippings she found. And in the post office box area, she framed photos of the three homes the post office was run out of before its current facility was built. She also designed a photo collage of past and present Sunset postal workers.
“All the residents seem to enjoy seeing it, and I have had a few travelers stop in just out of curiosity because they saw the banner from the road,” Link said. “So I feel like it’s a little post office with a touch of museum.”
“People need to understand keeping these small-town post offices open is not only important for the locals, but it keeps the history alive,” she added.
