Anyone who has ever tried to navigate a small town in North Carolina based on the directions of a local coot — a term I use lovingly — will surely get a chuckle out of this AP dispatch about efforts to update the demarcation of the boundary between the Carolinas. My favorite passage:
Surveyors trudged into wild areas that seem
to be all uphill during the winter months when foliage is thin and the
outlines of a ridge line dividing the states is best seen. Often, they
would spend hours walking into spots that can’t be reached by road,
Miller said.They came away impressed with work done with chains and poles two
centuries ago. Often those surveyors would mark trees to show the lines
or carve into stones notes like “S. C. and N. C., September 15th,
1815,” Miller said.One part of the line now is defined as running “118 poles to a
chestnut tree on the top of a ridge dividing the waters of the north
fork of the Pacolet River from the waters of the north fork of the
Saluda River.” A pole is 16.5 feet.The modern day surveyors couldn’t find any trees used for the border. “The chestnut blight killed them all,” Miller said.
Many of the stone markers are gone too. For instance, one marking
the intersection of the North Carolina state line and Greenville and
Spartanburg county lines was supposed to be in what had become a
hayfield, but Miller couldn’t find it.A man cutting hay told him it became part of an antique sale from a
nearby house. “They got a pickup truck, dug it up and moved it to a
museum,” Miller said.Miller found it in front of a railroad museum about three miles
north of the state line in Tryon, N.C., and recalls telling people
there “you’re not supposed to destroy the state line like that.”
No, indeed, you are not. I can’t believe people would stoop so low.
