Preserving West Ashley’s Past

A recently completed historical survey of unincorporated Charleston County shows there may still be a lot of work left to do in protecting West Ashley’s past.
While most preservationists’ eyes are trained on the peninsula, West Ashley has been the home of several historical scuffles of late.
The two most recent scuffles involved the tearing down of a DuWapp vegetable shed and a Colony Road chimney used to warm German prisoners of war interred off St. Andrews Boulevard during World War II.
Charleston County Planning Commissioner Charlie Smith, a West Ashley resident and realtor, threw himself into protecting the shed. He went so far a few years back as to jump out of his car and wave off demolition crews tearing down the structure at the corner of Wappoo Road and Savannah Highway.
Like the chimney, the shed came down, but in its place came a resolve in Smith and others to make sure that the same mistake didn’t happen again.
That resolve was bolstered last year when the county received a $60,000 grant, a relatively humble sum, to begin an historical and architectural survey within the unincorporated parts of the county.
This small survey is the first of such work done in the county since a comprehensive countywide 1992 survey.
A preliminary report of the survey was delivered two weeks ago, and named several sites in James Island and West Ashley, especially the Tobin Boyd School in Red Top, that may be worthy of preservation.
Smith, travelling in Bogota, Columbia, sent an email that said he was pleased that this step has been taken to “begin to pull the tattered edges of West Ashley back together.”
Local author Donna Jacobs — who writes the West Ashley Flashback column for this publication — has thrown herself into the effort, too. Jacobs is a local historian and frequent contributor to this publication. She joined with Smith in the unsuccessful attempt to get protection for the shed from the state.
Jacobs said that workshops that were held in preparation of the survey were well attended. Additionally, where the survey has found several African-American communities on James Island that may need further protection, there are as many as 12 such scattered throughout the rest of the county, including West Ashley, she said.
According to Jacobs, West Ashley is beginning to ripen historically, as some of its older neighborhoods are getting closer to their 100th birthdays.
Additionally, she said the survey has shown there are several smaller cemeteries throughout the area that may need to be protected, as well as an AME church at the corner of Wappoo Road and St. Andrews Boulevard.
“There’s a lot more historically in West Ashley than we realized,” said Jacobs, adding that the final survey report will be made before the end of the month.
Jacobs and Smith are going to be part of a special program entitled “Re-Discovering West Ashley’s Hidden History.” Hosted by the West Ashley-James Island Business Association (WAJIBA), the program will be held from 11:30 a.m.-1 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 28 at Bessinger’s BBQ on Savannah Highway. Joining Jacobs and Smith will be Ida Bootle, a treasure trove of West Ashley history. The group will discuss the historical survey and which West Ashley spots showed up on the list.
One thing Jacobs said there is no interest for in West Ashley, is the expansion of the city’s Board of Architectural Review (BAR), which some see as an onerous bully.
City Councilman Bill Moody couldn’t agree more, even though he lives in one of the arguably most historic homes in West Ashley.
“Look, I’ve got my feet firmly planted on both sides of the argument,”
laughed Moody.
On one hand, Moody has spent a small fortune rehabbing and restoring his home, the former caretaker’s marshfront residence at the plantation where Elisa Lucas Pinckney is said to have introduced indigo to the Lowcountry.
“On the other hand, I don’t want someone telling me what color to paint my house,” said Moody.
Looking out his wiggly-glassed windows on the rear of the house, Moody pointed to what he’s been told is a former “submarine net” intended to trap German mini-subs if they came up the Stono River on their way to attack the harbor shipyard during WWII.
While he removed the aluminum siding from an added-on wing from the house when he purchased it in the 1980s, he replaced it with Hardiplank fiber cement siding, and not cypress planks that cover the main part of the home.
“If they tried to bring BAR control over everything we do in West Ashley, I would oppose it,” said Moody.
Local historian and author Harlan Greene said West Ashley’s history and past is vanishing, and that it makes sense to protect certain elements.
“It’s like seeing the remnants of the city’s wall downtown and realizing this used to be a walled city,” said Greene, who’s also the head of special collections at the College of Charleston’s Addlestone Library on Calhoun Street.
“Maybe it would take seeing a vegetable shed in a neighborhood for people to realize that this was not always a suburb or a neighborhood, that West Ashley used to be fields,” said Greene.
Greene also pointed out that what one age thinks is historic and worthy of preservation “says a lot about that age,” adding that 30 years ago, there were no efforts to preserve anything African-American, like the Maryville/Ashleyville neighborhood in West Ashley, which resides within municipal protection.
 
Re-Discovering West Ashley’s Hidden History will be held on Wednesday, September 28 from 11:30 a.m. until 1 p.m.
at Bessinger’s BBQ, located at 1602 Savannah Hwy. Cost is free for WAJIBA members and $20 for non-members and includes a buffet lunch. For more information, email wajibiz@gmail.com.