Category: Green

The Lawsonian

3/4/2016

Okay, meet Val Green.

I have mentioned Val Green like a million times, and I'm always promising to eventually give you the whole Val Green story, and today's the day.

In the photo at right you see me, in the stupid hat, taking notes while Val, in the normal hat, tells me things about John Lawson. Beneath Val's hand are a map and one of his Lawson scrapbooks, which he's made over the course of decades as he figured out the exact path of Lawson's route.

Yes -- the exact path. Yes, decades.

Here's the story. Val is a sewer engineer, and he lives in South Carolina. I met him because in my early days of research about Lawson I found a story from the Charlotte Observer in 2001 that mentioned his interest in Lawson and his pursuit of Lawson's path, at that time generally sketched but not completely known. So I poked around until I found him, and my understanding of Lawson would never be the same.

In 1970, Val's (then-)wife gave him a copy of A New Voyage to Carolina as a gift, and he made his way through it, enjoying as he went. Two weeks into the voyage, Lawson describes being awakened:

When we were all asleep, in the Beginning of the Night, we were awaken'd with the dismall'st and most hideous Noise that ever pierc'd my Ears: This sudden Surprizal incapacitated us of guessing what this threatning Noise might proceed from; but our Indian Pilot (who knew these Parts very well) acquainted us, that it was customary to hear such Musick along that Swamp-side, there being endless Numbers of Panthers, Tygers, Wolves, and other Beasts of Prey, which take this Swamp for their Abode in the Day, coming in whole Droves to hunt the Deer in the Night, making this frightful Ditty 'till Day appears, then all is still as in other Places.

Val loved the sound of the place -- Tygers! Wolves! -- and thought he'd like to visit. Which brought up, of course, where might that place be? Well, at the time of the entry Lawson had been gone from Charleston a couple weeks, and according to his journal he'd been going up the Santee River for about a week. He had described the day before seeing "the most amazing Prospect I had seen since I had been in Carolina," a view from a hilltop over a swamp, looking towards far hills. Well, being from South Carolina himself, and knowing the terrain along the Santee River, Val suspected that Lawson must have been describing the top of the biggest hill in Poinsett State Park, which overlooks the Wateree River. In the distance from there you can see the Congaree, and the two join to form the Santee. Val visited the spot and it checked out. Further investigation to the south identified creeks that perfectly correlated to Lawson's descriptions of the terrain he had traveled. Val had found his spot -- and something to keep him busy the next four decades or so.

In a lovely photo taken by my friend Rob Waters, Val Green tells me stuff and I take notes. This is pretty much our constant dynamic to this day.

Poinsett State Park overlooks the Wateree and Congaree Rivers, which join to form the Santee.

He was hooked. As the next years -- and decades -- passed, Val spent more and more time chasing down spots that correlated with Lawson's descriptions. Many weren't terribly hard -- Lawson, guided by Indian traders and Indians, kept to well-worn Indian paths, like the famous Trading Path that runs from Georgia to Virginia, running northeast through the Piedmont from Charlotte towards Hillsborough. It got to Charlotte from the south in two parts -- the part Lawson followed came up from Camden, and another fork came from somewhat further west, towards what is now Augusta, Georgia.

This is an image from Val's scrapbook of decades' worth of Lawson research. Here he found on a property record a path, with the line, "Large swamp navigated by Lawson." Val shared this research with me freely. His contribution to this undertaking has been incalculable.

Val takes pictures of places and correlates them with Lawson's narrative.

If you can get there, Val's been there.

"The Routes of the Spaniards in 16th-Century Carolina: A Historical Narrative."

me, though, required serious investigation. Val has pawed through colonial papers, gone up to his armpits in plats, deeds, maps, and property records. He's worn out many DeLorme Atlas & Gazetteers of South and North Carolina as he has traced, retraced, and improved his route. He has scrapbooks filled with maps, photographs, deeds, plats, and drawings. And by the end of his work, Val had understood, pretty much exactly, where Lawson had gone, though like any good researcher he's always willing to reconsider in the light of further evidence. Over the course of my journey Val visited me on the trail at least a half-dozen times, more than once taking me by the hand and guiding me. I make no exaggeration when I say that without Val I simply would not have been able to undertake this project.

And then Val moved on. Lawson led him to the Spaniards -- Hernando de Soto and Juan Pardo -- who wandered the same area a century-and-a-half before. In some cases the Spaniards used the same paths Lawson eventually used, and Lawson's trail is what led Val to the Spaniards.

You scarcely need me to tell you that once Val gets on the case he stays there, so it's no surprise that the most current volume of South Carolina Antiquities (Vol. 47, 2015), which just came out, includes a piece by Val: "The Routes of the Spaniards in 16th-Century Carolina: A Historical Narrative." I have seen successful Ph.D. theses that were less carefully researched.

I hear from Val right much still, and he came to meet me when my boys and I paddled into Bath at the end of my retracing of Lawson's journey. Now that I'm at work on the book of this undertaking, I'm sure I'll be reaching out to Val for more help and more background and more facts -- and I'll tell you about some of that. For the moment, though, just take a minute to appreciate Val. Val knows more about Lawson and Lawson's journey than any person alive.

I am grateful to all the people who have helped me understand

Lawson, his times, his journey, and his surroundings. But however you shake out the list of the Lawsonians -- I include Vince Bellis of ECU; Tom Earnhardt of Exploring North Carolina; Tom Magnuson, of the Trading Path Association; Dale Loberger, of more things than you can shake a stick at; and Wayne Hardee of the Grifton Museum, among others -- Val Green is its leader.

Anyhow, now you know.

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The Hollow Rocks

8/19/2015

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This could be the hollow rock of which Lawson speaks, but there's tons of them. I love seeing the exact things he did.

Christopher Jacques: Hero of the Lawson Trek.

Not long after he left the Occanneechee village that we know was on the Eno River at present-day Hillsborough, Lawson tells of a strange custom his Indian guides demonstrate.

"The next day, we went over several Tracts of rich Land, but mix'd with Pines and other indifferent Soil. In our way, there stood a great Stone about the Size of a large Oven, and hollow; this the Indians took great Notice of, putting some Tobacco into the Concavity, and spitting after it. I ask'd them the reason of their so doing, but they made me no Answer."

Given which, when you find that your path takes you by the Hollow Rock Racquet & Swim Club in western Durham, you have to feel like you're on the right track. Not that I found this by myself, mind you; my ever trustworthy guide Val Green sent me looking for the rock, which he's found himself, and when I couldn't get exact directions I did what any reporter would do: I reached out to the club.

Within a day or two I had heard from activities and camp director Christopher Jacques, who told me that his query caused a nameless board member to go on a quest he'd meant to make for five years: "namely, where is the actual Hollow Rock," the member said. Well, not far off, as it happens. Just down Erwin Road from the club you follow a private drive up to the New Hope Creek, which runs along a seam of granite on its south side, the creek a good ten feet or more below the gravel road above. In the side of that outcropping that is almost a cliff, beneath the lichens and the mosses, are many large expressions of granite, and in some of them you find little potholes -- rendering the stone hollow, just as Lawson said.

Potholes in granite on the top are easy to understand -- rain collects in low places, begins to erode the rock, whether because of acids in the water or the action of freezing and cooling. That makes the depression deeper and soon you have a pothole; in rivers or areas that food the flow of water, swirling around sediment that scours the hole, makes the pothole even deeper.

What makes a pothole in the side of a rock I have no idea; I'll check with a geologist and get back to you.

Anyhow, along the way from Hillsborough to western Durham, Lawson followed what Tom Magnuson of the Trading Path Association called "the old central coast road -- it goes all the way from the mountains to the sea." Magnuson doubts that Lawson ever actually made it to Hillsborough, mind you -- he believes he stopped somewhat short of there and didn't cross the Eno until days later -- but from that area to the Indian settlement Lawson called Adshusheer, the central coast road was the way. That road turned into Old NC 10, which I walked along towards the Hollow Rocks.

This one?

No tobacco or spit in here.

Hollower and hollower.

Magnuson and my constant inspiration and informer Val Green disagree about Lawson's exact route here -- Magnuson has him walking north of the hollows and Green has him coming up from the south. Green's route has to recommend it that it actually walks right past them, but either route takes you within a quarter mile of these potholes. I explored them and found utterly thrilling that I was where I KNEW Lawson had been. By what route he got there seemed somehow less important. I had no tobacco, and I didn't spit. Val tells me he's heard from somewhere that the Indian families used to tell their children that lightning would hide in those holes, so they should keep their hands out of them. Val suspects the tall tale was a scare tactic to keep children from sticking their hands in and encountering venomous snakes.

Magnuson, already generous with his time, became a true Hero of the Lawson Trek by taking me on a driving tour of the area, stopping here and there to show me spots where fragments of the old road still exist. I loved seeing them -- you can usually tell because there are berms to the side, showing where road builders dug to maintain slope, which Magnuson links back to the English Highways Act of 1555, which first organized highway cost and maintenance as an obligation of the population.

It's obviously an old road when Tom Magnuson tells you it is. But I walked right by it without noticing it a couple hours later.

That's Tom Magnuson, driving me all over hell and gone to show off old pieces of the paths Lawson trod -- and help me get started.

Of all the things I found at the hollow rocks, though, I most loved two things. One was how easy it is to see these old roads -- when you have Tom or Val to point them out, as I so often have. But with Tom I found, as I have with Val, that even though when they point me in their direction in the morning, I am perfectly capable of walking past an old road and utterly failing to notice it by noon that same day. This stuff takes work, and their hours of study enriches us all.

The other thing I deeply loved was Lawson's note that the Indians just refused to answer his question. "Hey, you guys -- why'd you spit in that rock, huh? What's the deal with the tobacco, too?" No answer. Shut up, tourist -- not everything is your business. Anybody who's ever been a reporter or interviewed anybody for any reason at all recognizes this interaction. No matter how helpful people are, after a while even the nicest and most patient just get sick of you. Lawson had been following Indian guides for nearly two months, and though he went from guide to guide, one can easily imagine they were getting sick of his questions.

So as I stood at the hollow rocks, because of the patient, generous help of countless people answering constant questions, I took a moment of pure gratitude. Lawson never mentioned it, but I suspect that when he noted for one of the very few times in his book that someone refused to answer one of his questions, he took a moment to reflect on how grateful he was that mostly they did answer him.

I know I did.

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The Roadness of Roads

2/23/2015

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At the intersection of swamp and No Trespassing, the trail ran out. No sign, no further blazes, no marking: nothing. It just ran out there in the swamp.

So I did what you do, wandering and poking and eventually finding A path, which was going sort of in the right direction and eventually hooked up with THE path, a quarter mile away or so, and I went along my way. But this is what comes of walking on wilderness paths rather than roads, and I have walked a good bit on both over the last segment of the Trek and, surprising nobody, I have something to say about it.

My friend Dale Loberger not long ago gave a small seminar on how to find old roads -- I remember thinking he was talking about the Roadness of roads. That is, a road is a fairly simple thing: it starts someplace travelers are, and it leads someplace travelers wish to be. Whether those travelers are animals, native Americans, colonists, carts, railroad trains, or automobiles -- or, as in many cases, each of those in succession -- a road is a connector. Perhaps not the shortest but the best way between two points.

Look at an old map, Loberger told us, and the drawings of roads worried less about exact representations of twists and turns than on connections: from the Indian town to the good place to ford the river; from the trading post to the harbor; from the town to the good pass through the mountain. A road in some way invented itself. It partook, Platonists might say, of Roadness.

Like, for example, the way I've been traveling this Trek, when i'm not cursing my way along sometimes-maintained wilderness trails whose organizations are trying to do a great deal with few resources. (The trail that frustrated me this time was the Palmetto Trail, a fine trail-in-progress stretching the length of South Carolina that suffers from logging that destroys it and, again, with trying very hard to do much with little.)

I've been walking along a sand road that has probably been trodden by human feet for a thousand years of more. It follows a route that was an Indian path during the Mississippian period, stretching all the way to the Santee Mound we visited during our last trek. The Indians walked it. Lawson and his group walked it. Colonials walked it. "There aren't too many roads in American that are a thousand years old," my friend and fellow Lawsonian Val Green says. "But this one is." (More on Val soon, by the way.) (And by the way, calling Val a "fellow Lawsonian" is a bit like calling LeBron James a fellow basketball player; Val is the king of the hill, by an order of magnitude.)

Anyhow. I spoke to Val as I planned this segment, which follows the swamp on the northeastern edge of the Wateree River, which joins the Congaree to form the Santee, on which the Trek has spent so much time. These rivers are named for the native tribes who lived along them, and Lawson describes them all, visiting their towns as he moves along.

But the path he describes would have lain, naturally, on the far edge of the swamp -- the path that could have been depended on to be dry most times, regardless of the state of the river or swamp. Last segment we visited the Santee Indian Mound, considered the easternmost edge of the Mississippian Indian culture. Since then, more or less, we've been following a trail along the Santee and Wateree that would have connected all the tribes along the waterway.

It's been mostly asphalt before, but this time I've been on dirt roads -- more correctly sand roads, since as we've exited the coastal plain we've entered sand hills, the result of the floor of an ancient sea near its shore.

Anyhow, I've walked these sandy miles, and every step has radiated roadness. A stand of holly -- a ton of holly in these hills -- to the left, commonly a pine farm to the other side. Dips down to creeks, rises to plateaus, and occasionally a home site or church, a graveyard, a stand of deciduous trees showing that once upon a time a home stood nearby. It's a lovely kind of walking that makes you feel that you simply are where you ought to be. To be sure, Route 261, the state asphalt two-lane that generally follows the same path only more smoothly and faster, is a half-mile to the west. But this sand road, skirting the edge of the swamp, exudes a kind of patient assuredness that its adolescent asphalt cousin cannot duplicate.

Lawson describes this path, mentioning camping "by a small swift Run of Water, which was pav'd at the Bottom with a Sort of Stone much like to Tripoli," a kind of silica schist often called rottenstone or fuller's earth. I passed while walking this segment at the Tavern Creek, whose banks are covered with just that, and it flows just as swiftly as ever. More important, when Lawson and his friends told their Indian guide, Santee Jack, that they'd like to hang around the creek another day, he assured them they'd be happier half a day further.

Call it Tripoli, as Lawson did, or Fuller's Earth or rottenstone, this stuff crumbles from the banks of the Tavern Creek, assuring historian Val Green that he had pegged Lawson exactly where Green thought he was. And me too, once Green pointed the way.

Swift running to be sure, to say nothing of lovely and delightful. If I hadn't been chilly, I'd have sat down for lunch by this shady spot.

So they went -- as did I -- and a half day further we were all rewarded with the view from the overlook at Poinsett State Park. (Named for Joel Poinsett, the South Carolinian for whom we name the Poinsettia). Atop a genuine hill -- it's several hundred feet up, and you notice it when you climb -- you look to the west, down across the swamp the road has skirted for miles.

""We mov'd forwards, and about twelve a Clock came to the most amazing Prospect I had seen since I had been in Carolina; we travell'd by a Swamp-side, which Swamp I believe to be no less than twenty Miles over, the other Side being as far as I could well discern, there appearing great Ridges of Mountains, bearing from us. W.N.W."

If you go to Poinsett State Park (and I think you should), there is an Overlook Shelter, a little gazebo atop the park's high point. and from it, looking west and northwest, you have a view over the swamps that is, truly, the first great prospect you'll find as you travel into the Carolina midlands. Val Green (him again!) met me here, and he pointed out that if you look carelessly you easily see the ridge of pines on the far edge of the Wateree Swamp, which is several miles distant. But if you look very carefully -- I brought binoculars against just such a possibility and was glad of it -- you can see, in distant, faded blue, the line of hills on the far side of the Congaree swamp, a good twenty miles distant.

If you look carefully, you can see more than the close row of trees, which defines the far edge of the Wateree Swamp -- the other edge of the swamp along the river Lawson was following. You can also see, towards the left of the horizon, another deep blue line. That's the range of hills on the far edge of the Congaree Swamp. And just as Lawson thought, it's a good 15 to 20 miles distant. An amazing Prospect indeed.

Lawson mentions that "One Alp, with a Top like a Sugar-loaf, advanc'd its Head above all the resst very considerably," and until recent years, both Val and park manager Zabo McCants tell me, you could see Cook's Mountain, ten or so miles away to the north-northwest. Timber has grown up to block the view, but since a paper mill now stands in that direction too, Zabo says he's loth to cut down the screening woods, because exposing the charming Cook's Mountain would expose much that is less lovely.

That's me in the gazebo, making with the stoic pose, looking through binoculars at the far row of hills.

Kinda hard to see, but if you look right in the middle, you can see one "peak" higher than the others. I believe that's the same mountain Lawson saw, now called Cook's Mountain, even though it's only 300 or so feet high.

In any case. I stood atop a ridge where Lawson stood and I saw what he saw. And above all I left tracks in the sand along the same path trodden by Lawson, by Val, by traders and colonists and Indians -- and by walkers and timber farmers and locals today. I don't think many asphalt roads can equal this.

I spent a few days on the road -- a REAL road.

I recommend it.

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Along the Path

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