When we looked at what to do around Hartsville, one of the highlights we read about was Kalmia Gardens, so off we went. Besides seeing this lovely garden area, we learned about the town and the university where our granddaughter’s soccer team would be playing.
What is it?
At the cotton museum we visited the next day (and will be highlighted in the next post), the director said this bench was known as a courting bench. Here’s what I found about it online:
“Many South Carolina homes had these benches that they called Joggling Boards.
“Many people believed that if your front porch had a joggling board, you would never have an unwed daughter in the house. This might be because the boards were also called “courting benches,” so named because young couples that sat at either end would slowly slide to the center!
“If someone invites you to sit with them on their joggling board, it may also be considered an invitation for friendship.”
Now back to the gardens.
Now for some answers to our questions.
His house was built with timber cut from the property and is now on the National Register of Historic Places. The founder of the gardens was Mrs. David Robert Coker. She began transforming what was then a desolate area into a calming and beautiful place. (We’ll learn about her husband in the next post.) The name of these 30 acres of gardens comes from the mountain laurel bushes, known as Kalmia, which are everywhere in the gardens.
Tomorrow we’re going to a cotton museum and learn about the crop that was grown in this area.
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