Courtesy Photo

Former Hagood Mill Site director Ed Bolt will be remembered by friends and family during a tribute set for Saturday at the mill.

Hagood Mill to honor Bolt on Saturday

Friends and family will join together at the Hagood Mill Historic Site Saturday from 10 a.m.-4 p.m. to pay tribute to the life of Ed Bolt.

Bolt was the mill’s site director for the past 16 years before he died unexpectedly at age 60 in December.

Saturday’s event — part of the “Music in the Mountains 2014” series — will feature a memorial concert including many of Bolt’s closest friends as performers and guests. Visitors are encouraged to bring lawn chairs, instruments and singing voices to help celebrate Bolt’s life.

Much of what visitors see today at the site can be attributed directly to Bolt’s vision and efforts.

“He was a person who really affected us deeply, making us part of what we are today,” Pickens County Museum director Allen Coleman said in the wake of Bolt’s passing. “What you see at Hagood Mill is a result of his vision and that of those in Pickens County, both of which made the site a tourism destination.”

Coleman said Bolt would “forever live at the Hagood Mill.”

Bolt was a graduate of North Greenville College and retired from Alice Manufacturing after 25 years of service. He served as curator of the Pickens County Museum before becoming site manager at Hagood Mill. He is survived by his wife, Michelle, two sons, two daughters and two grandchildren. Memorials may be made to the Hagood Mill Fund, c/o the Pickens County Museum, 307 Johnson St., Pickens, SC 29671.

The mill was closed for months following Bolt’s death before recently reopening under new director Billy Crawford.

The mill is located at 138 Hagood Mill Road three miles north of Pickens off U.S. Highway 178.

For more information, contact the Hagood Mill Site at (864) 898-2936.