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Old Home Sites near Long Creek Oconee County, SC January 2021 |
All Text & Images: Copyright (2021) |
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Old Home Sites near Long Creek Oconee County, SC January 2021 |
All Text & Images: Copyright (2021) |
| An exploration for old home sites (specifically chimneys) near the site of the former Long Creek Bog. Site OC01: This first chimney turned out to probably be something other than a home place. Perhaps a cane syrup mill. |
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| Chimney - front The remains of the first chimney I found were about 3 feet high. |
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| Chimney - rear This chimney is in an odd location, at the edge of the former bog's flood plain, near the current creek. |
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| The structure seems to be somewhat buried / silted in, possibly from the time when this was a beaver-impounded bog. |
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| The chimney is fronted by a stone foundation, about 3 ft wide x 14 ft long. (Difficult to see in this image, being somewhat buried and covered by leaves & ferns.) The narrow foundation suggests that this might have been a cane syrup mill. |
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| The configuration is similar to this brick cane syrup evaporator. (Photo courtesy of nwaonline.com) |
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| Another example, made of rock, like the one I found... (Photo courtesy of Blind Pig and the Acorn website) |
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| Home site OC02, located nearby: |
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| This old home site contained two chimneys, although one has completely collapsed. The collapsed chimney is faintly visible at center background, about 20 ft beyond the standing chimney. |
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| Front view The chimney remains are about 10 ft tall. See hiking pole for scale |
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| Note the large lintel stone Much of the chimney has collapsed, filling in most of the fireplace hearth opening. |
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| Side view, taken from the second (collapsed) chimney. |
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| Stones from the collapsed chimney |
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| Rear-side of chimney |
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| One more view of the chimney at site OC02 |
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| Returning to the first chimney, and continuing on, I came across a third chimney. Home site OC03: |
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| Side view. These remains were about 4 ft high. |
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| Rear view |
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| View from the opposite side |
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| Eventually heading back to my parking spot, I came across one more old chimney. Home site OC04: |
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| This chimney had the smallest remains of any I found on this day. |
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| Front of the chimney There wasn't much left of this one. |
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| Rear of chimney |
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| I came across this wall, which looked awfully familiar. It occurred to me that it was the same construction as the wall at the trailhead to Reedy Branch Falls. That wall was originally to be the entrance for a failed subdivision, but the USFS eventually bought the land. This wall is on the same tract of land, about a mile away, so I guess it was originally going to be the rear entrance to that community. |
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| Subdivision entrance wall |
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| Subdivision entrance wall |
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| Rear entrance to (failed) subdivision |
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| Subdivision entrance wall |
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| Subdivision entrance wall |
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| For reference, compare this image taken in 2016 of the "main" entrance at Reedy Branch Falls with the preceding image... |
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| Another photo from 2016 of the wall at the "main" subdivision entrance. |