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Not Acting in Georgetown (9/1/25)

If you are somewhere where Labor Day is celebrated, happy Labor Day! It’s an early one this year, and already the beginning of another month.

When Bob and I were meeting our homeowners, they mentioned that they acted and stage managed at a theater in the nearby city of Georgetown, South Carolina. We looked up Georgetown and decided that perusing their Historic District and Harborwalk might be a good plan for today when the masses might be enjoying Labor Day at one of the beaches.

The city of Georgetown (population of about 9,000) is about 30 miles from the house.

Crossing the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway

During our walk we learned that Georgetown was formally founded in 1729, making it South Carolina’s 3rd oldest city after Charleston and Beaufort. Its economy was at one time heavily based on the labor intensive crop of rice, and the slave population was about 85% of the total population during the 1800s. The Civil War and social/political changes as well as a few hurricanes put an end to rice as a major agricultural product.

A map of the small historic district along Front Street,
which parallels the Sampit River

One of the first structures we saw was a clock tower. It is located atop a Greek Revival market and town hall built in 1842 after a fire destroyed most of the buildings on Front Street. An open air market was on the 1st floor and the town hall was on the 2nd. The clock tower and belfry were added in 1845.

The clock tower
The Strand Theater which keeps our homeowners busy
A fountain and some shops at the start of our walk
A pocket park between stores
Some fun art along one building
More of the buildings on Front Street. The backs of them also face the River, so we saw them on our Harborwalk as well.
The Robert Stewart House, built between 1740 and 1770. President Washington spent the night in this house
on his southern tour in 1791.
The Kaminski House, built sometime between 1750 and 1800.
It was home for many years for Harold Kaminski (and his family), who was a local County Commissioner, Mayor,
and US Navy Officer.

A park connecting Front Street to one end of the Harborwalk displayed a few items of local and national history.

A memorial for the 1st African American to serve
in the US House of Representatives, beginning in 1870.
These brick display cases show copies
of the three Charters of Freedom —
The Declaration of Independence, The Constitution,
and the Bill of Rights.
A fountain at the end of the small park
Looking down the Sampit River
Looking the other direction towards the shops,
restaurants, and marina
Some of the restaurants and housing facing the river
Finding a tower of heads along the Harborwalk.
This is “Generations” by Roy Smith.
A small, independent hotel called The George back on Front Street.
Peeking into its restaurant

We walked a little bit into a local neighborhood, which unsurprisingly, was very Carolina-esque — lots of big homes with porches. We also loved the big trees that provided a nice amount of shade.

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