The Item - South Carolina

BRITTON SIDING: A Southern Micro-Community
A siding is defined as a short railroad track opening onto a main track at one or both ends. In 1912 John Bossard Britton made a decision to move his country store one mile from U. S. Highway 521 to the newly created railroad siding that would soon bear his family name. The newly constructed railroad ran parallel to the Manning Highway and created stops at Brogdon, Harvin, Alcolu and Manning. The rail service continued to the community of Lane, located along the main Atlantic Coast Line which ran from Florence to Kingstree. The trains eventually arrived in Charleston, where passengers could then opt to travel to...

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Sumter Cemeteries
" In the long ago during the time when families amassed fortunes in lands and built large neighboring plantation homes, there were very close ties binding sons and fathers and brothers and sisters to one another. Then when the family circle was broken by death, the desire to keep the same nearness prompted the tradition of the family graveyard, which was kept with loving care by the survivors." Cassie Nichols.

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Rural schools
The education of children living in the rural regions of our county during the early 1800s was primarily the responsibility of the parents. The level or degree of instruction children received often depended on the amount of resources and ambition possessed by their family. The ministers and pastors of the local churches often became the first schoolmasters.

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