1905, Georgetown’s Golden Year

Maritime history in Georgetown, by Hastings Hensel
South Carolina Living Magazine (Read the entire article HERE)

THE ECONOMIC FORTUNES OF GEORGETOWN have always been subject to a kind of tidal fluctuation. Indigo, rice, lumber, tourism—each cash crop and industry has risen and fallen through wartime and peacetime, through fiscal boom and bust.

But for every setback, Georgetown finds a way to build itself back up, a resiliency made possible by the fact that it is a port city situated on the Winyah Bay, between the Atlantic Ocean and the many rivers that lead into the state’s interior.

In “1905: Georgetown’s Golden Year,” the lead exhibit at the South Carolina Maritime Museum, visitors can relive the boom times created during the port’s busiest year on record. 

Dec. 19, 1905, marked the 100th anniversary of the town’s incorporation, and with business at an all-time high, Georgetown residents threw themselves a glorious Centennial Celebration. Mayor William Doyle Morgan acted as master of ceremonies for a boat parade on the Sampit River that included yachts, lumber ships and the monitors USS Nevada and USS Arkansas. The waterfront festivities were followed by an equally festive land parade down Front Street in the heart of downtown.

The Golden Year exhibit features 35 enlarged black-and-white photos (many taken during the celebration)  newspaper clips and other artifacts that serve as a snapshot of the moment when “the city on the Sampit” was flush with money and optimism, says museum director Susan Sanders.

“It captures the whole festive, explosive energy that was in this area in 1905, which was the pinnacle year for the lumber industry era,” she says.

On display through 2013, the Golden Year exhibit is the second major display created by the nonprofit museum since the doors opened to the public in December 2011 (corrected date from original article). 

You can view the exhibit images on the SCMM website gallery HERE  and take a look at the Tripsmarter video below.