A local's eye view
This wisteria puts on a show every year. The house it adorns was built c. 1800-1806 on Meeting Street. In 1824, its owners hosted the Marquis de Lafayette (a hero of both the American and French Revolutions) on his visit to the United States.
The bells of St. Michael’s are greatly traveled. They were imported from England in 1764 and were stolen by the British in 1782, but later returned. The bells have since returned to England twice more to be recast. They are one set of four that be heard pealing throughout downtown Charleston.
Built around 1865, 21 King Street, aka the Patrick O’Donnell House, is the largest Italianate style house in Charleston. There are differing stories behind its nickname, O’Donnell’s Folly, but none are too favorable.
The Limehouse family built the brick house in 1830 and owned the land the street is on — which is named after them. Today the Limehouse name is often associated with fruits and vegetables, as Limehouse Produce is a big supplier to the local restaurants.
The congregation of First Baptist Church, located on Church Street, was founded in Kittery, Maine (but at that time it was part of Massachusetts) in 1682. 26 of the congregants moved to Charleston in 1696. This church building was built in 1820.
This beautiful entrance is to the George Williams Coach House, fronting Church Street. Now a beautiful standalone house, it originally was a dependency building for the Williams Mansion — which is the largest single family house in Charleston (and it appeared in the ABC TV mini-series the North and the South).
If you look to the right of the rising sun, seen from Waterfront Park, you can spot Shute’s Folly — a small, low lying island in the middle of Charleston Harbor. Originally used to house defensive fortifications for Charleston, the property was bought by Charlestonian Joseph Shute in 1746 — for which he seems to have been ridiculed.
Over time the island passed through a number of ownership hands, but retained the Folly name. It eventually became home to Castle Pinckney, which was originally built in 1797 and then demolished in 1804 by a hurricane. The masonry Castle Pinckney, whose remains can still be seen, was completed in 1808.
Unlike Seward’s Folly, which picked up the snappy new name of Alaska, this folly remains credited to poor Mr. Shute.
Some wonderful azaleas in White Point Garden. Near this spot the pirate Stede Bonnet was hanged in 1718.
This wonderful Charleston scene can be found on Orange Street… so named as there used to be orange groves in the area.
The gates to this flower-covered entry on Tradd Street each have a dragon on it. It is appropriate, as this was the house of the famed science fiction writer Robert Jordan ( his pen name).