Mortgage Broker in Florence, SC

FLORENCE – Beneath layers of grit, dirt and rubble in the middle of downtown, archaeologists are finding the remnants of early life in Florence.

There’s pale white buttons, the cage from a bottle of champagne, even the heel of a woman’s shoe.

The objects were found after archaeologists spent several weeks in September and October digging at the corner of Coit and Baroody streets, once the site of Gamble’s Hotel.

The hotel, long since destroyed, was a major landmark for Florence’s first residents.

It was built in 1860 just steps away from the railroad that put Florence on the map, and it hosted many of the city’s founders as they shaped the future of the Pee Dee.

“It is just an enormously important site in the history of Florence,” said Ben Zeigler, chair of the Archaeological Institute of the Pee Dee. “It is really the origins of the city of Florence.”

The institute has partnered with the city, Florence County and the Florence County Museum to sponsor the $40,000 project.

It will likely be the last opportunity to explore the site for many years. Urban Square, a $65 million multi-use development spearheaded by the city, will soon fill the block.

It’s also the first urban archaeology ever done in Florence. Advocates hope it won’t be the last.

“This is the first technical urban archaeology that's ever happened in the city. This is our example,” said Andrew Agha, the archaeologist leading the dig. “So, this is sort of ground zero for all future archaeology projects in the city.”

With two stories, 20 rooms, an entrance hall, parlor, dining room and living quarters, Gamble’s Hotel was an impressive first sight for visitors arriving by rail.

A photo from 1861 shows women in white dresses lounging on the second floor balcony. Men have gathered in chairs in the street outside. They lean back, their legs crossed.

A porch with high ceilings and engraved columns stretched across the front of the building. Brick chimneys sprouted from the top. Broad windows with dark shutters were spaced evenly on either side of the central tower, which looked out over the fledgling city.

It was believed to be the largest wood frame building in South Carolina at the time, Agha said.

The hotel sat just across the street from the passenger depot in the heart of Florence.

Visitors such as Robert E. Lee and Ulysses S. Grant would have emerged from the forests of South Carolina to see the gleaming new building as they pulled into town.

Originally named the Florence Hotel, the North Eastern Rail Road Company built the business to attract investors and show off the city it was building. The company had bought the property that would be Florence in the 1850s, laying out the streets and naming them after local dignitaries.

“Florence was not just an organically grown result of railroad activity; it was an intentionally planned, profit-driven enterprise,” Stephen Motte, the Florence County Museum curator for collections and interpretation, wrote in an email.

The hotel was owned and managed by Joseph Gamble, a North Carolina native first employed by the North Eastern Rail Road. He lived in the hotel with his wife and two sons until his death, according to an account of early Florence written by Eugene “Nick” Zeigler, called “Village to City.”

Nick Zeigler was Ben Zeigler’s father.

In these early years, the hotel served as a cultural and political center.

“Florence County grew out of the town, and the town grew out of Gamble’s Hotel,” Motte wrote.

Zeigler said the first town council likely met in the hotel.

The Episcopal congregation used a small building behind it for its first meetings, and school classes were taught there as well, according to “Village to City.” Community organizations held celebrations and fundraisers there in the 1870s.

A flier from 1878 advertises “three grand chaste entertainments” held at Gamble’s Hall for the benefit of the Florence Library Association and the Ladies Memorial Association. The events included an instrumental and vocal concert, a silhouette performance and a three act comedy.

Admission was 25 cents.

During the Civil War, the hotel was the site of a skirmish between Union and Confederate cavalry, Florence’s only real action in the war.

Hundreds of troops fought in the streets outside the hotel on March 5, 1865. Federal forces had been sent to destroy the railroad equipment, but they were kept at bay by Confederate cavalry that happened to be staying at the hotel.

After the Civil War, federal troops lived at Gamble's Hotel throughout Reconstruction, and it served as the headquarters for the Freedmen’s Bureau.

Eventually, the hotel no longer hosted visitors. It was used first as an event space and then as a private residence for Gamble and his family, Motte said.

In the late 1870s, the railroad companies closed their shops or moved them farther east, near what is now East Florence. The center of town moved with the railroad, and Gamble’s Hotel was no longer the beating heart of the city.

In August 1893, four years after Gamble’s death, the building burned to the ground in an early morning conflagration, Agha said.

If you dig deep enough, you’ll find a layer of soot and ash that marks the hotel’s final resting place.

The archaeological team, composed primarily of Agha and his technician Sarah Bruno, took advantage of a pause in construction at Urban Square to spend several weeks seeing what they could uncover.

The archaeologists used heavy machinery to scrape away the rubble from the old bus station that was built on the corner and break through the packed earth.

They dug holes throughout the site, searching for signs of activity. When they found a promising location, they began excavating, revealing stratified layers of history. They sifted through the dirt, slowly, painstakingly picking out fragments from the lives of Florence’s first residents.

Agha’s archaeological work focuses on sites from the early history of European colonization and the growth of the American continent. He’s spent much of his professional life in the Charleston area working on urban digs.

Urban archaeology presents challenges, but it also comes with opportunities, he said.

Objects from Gamble’s Hotel have been uniquely preserved. The dirt at the site has been compacted, covered over, and kept free from water, rodents or prying roots. The objects have been frozen in place for decades.

“Cities build up through time. … So, all of those layers of culture are layers of protection. And when you get down to the bottom, you get some of the best preserved things,” Agha said.

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Excavating objects from the last 200 years may seem less exciting than uncovering objects from thousands of years ago, but it is no less important, Zeigler said.

With each new object, historians are learning a little more about what life was like, especially for people whose stories were not celebrated at the time.

Excavating the Gamble’s Hotel site is especially exciting for Agha because it was so much at the heart of life in Florence.

People of all different backgrounds used the hotel for everything from business meetings to celebrations to funerals. That means a broad spectrum of objects are stuck just beneath the surface.

The archaeologists have found copious amounts of ginger beer bottles and wine bottles, dinnerware, seals, buttons, even scraps of leather that would have been attached to clothing.

The archaeology also provides a window, albeit a slim one, into the lives of the people who aren’t represented in the historical record.

“My excitement with this, and why I'm really, really into this dig ... it's the backline of the hotel,” Agha said, pointing to the southern edge of the lot. “That's where the enslaved worked and where the enslaved Africans serviced this hotel and all the guests for the handful of years before freedom.”

Many of the people who kept the hotel running likely continued to work at the hotel after emancipation. Their stories, however, have been ignored or erased by written history. The archaeologists hope they can help fill in the gaps.

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Gesturing across the site, Agha imagined what it was like to live and work in the back lot of the hotel.

There was likely a laundry, perhaps a smokehouse or cold storage. There might have been a carriage house for the horses.

The workers would have lived in the kitchens, or maybe in small, unadorned buildings.

Trash would have been deposited wherever there was space, in shallow holes or conspicuous piles. The archaeologists have found pieces of animal bone, shards of glass and unidentified metal objects — the refuse of the day.

The workers might have laid boards across the yard to avoid trudging through what would have been akin to barnyard muck, a result of the dirty bath water, waste and other organic matter that was tossed into the yard.

Agha can still see the remnants of that muck today, he said, rubbing the sticky black dirt between his fingers.

“They're almost forced to work in this mess to keep this clean facade and to keep the rooms clean,” Agha said. “All the people as they're experiencing the hotel and having a good time, it's a very neat, clean, tidy environment. But the back lots — it's 100 percent different from that.”

One of the most exciting finds has been the remains of the hotel’s foundation. The remains — brick slabs a few feet across — likely mark the edge of the porch or corners of the building.

Construction done in the intervening years has substantially damaged those piers, but they’re still recognizable — chunks of orange and red brick protruding from the ground.

“This is the foundation of Florence right here,” Zeigler said, standing at what would have been the northeast corner of the building.

Agha and Bruno still have more work to do. Now that the dig has been completed, they will analyze the recovered objects and dive into the archives to contextualize the findings.

Agha hopes that, as he completes the work, the recovered history can be incorporated into the history yet to be written.

Urban Square, which will include apartments, townhomes, a parking garage and a retail center, is set to be a major part of Florence’s urban landscape. The apartments will open sometime in 2025 on the Gamble’s Hotel site.

Whether they know it or not, the new residents will be living on top of history.

These Covid tracking pages are no longer being updated. Get the latest information from the Centers for Disease Control, or find archived data from The Times’s three year reporting effort here.

An updated vaccine is recommended for adults and most children. Statewide, 7% of vaccinations did not specify a home county.

Source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Notes: The hospitals map shows the average I.C.U. occupancy at nearby hospitals in the most recent week with data reported. The data is self-reported to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services by individual hospitals. It excludes counts from hospitals operated by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and the Indian Health Service. Numbers for hospitalized patients are based on inpatient beds and include I.C.U. beds. Hospitalized Covid-19 patients include both confirmed and suspected Covid-19 patients. The C.D.C. stopped reporting data on cases in May 2023.

How trends have changed in Florence County

Source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Notes: Weekly county death data prior to Jan. 2021 was not reported by the C.D.C. and is sourced from reporting by The New York Times. Hospitalization data is a weekly average of Covid-19 patients in hospital service areas that intersect with Florence County. Hospitalization numbers early in the pandemic are undercounts due to incomplete reporting by hospitals to the federal government.

Historical trends in Florence County

The data in these charts has been archived and they are no longer being updated.

Source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The data in these charts has been archived and they are no longer being updated. Weekly county case data prior to Jan. 2021 was not reported by the C.D.C. and is sourced from reporting by The New York Times. The C.D.C. stopped reporting data on cases in May 2023. Test positivity data is based only on test results reported to the federal government and is a seven-day average.

Slim Chickens, a fast-casual restaurant known for its chicken, sauces and and side dishes, will open at 1530 S. Church Street in Florence in the middle of March, franchise owner Larry Chandler said.

Chandler's nephew, Jody Chandler, has been a partner in the Chandler Restaurant Group, LLC for 18 years.

Jody Chandler of Florence holds a bachelor's degree from Francis Marion University. He graduated in 1992.

"He has been a big part of it. We are partners in the Slim Chickens and Firehouse Subs," Larry Chandler said.

The duo decided to partner with Slim Chickens after experiencing the delicious food and Southern hospitality of the fast-casual restaurant chain, Chandler said.

The Florence Slim Chickens will be Chandler's second in the state. He opened a Slim Chickens in Moncks Corner in December.

Chandler said he is in in the midst of the permitting process for Slim Chickens locations in Conway and Myrtle Beach. He hopes to have those restaurants open in late July or August.

The Florence Slim Chickens is tentatively scheduled to open March 18. Employee training is scheduled to start March 11, Chandler said.

The restaurant manager already is training at the Moncks Corner location. The Florence Slim Chickens has hired nearly 100 employees so far, Chandler said, adding he expects the total to reach approximately 125.

The Florence restaurant will be open from 10:30 a.m. to 10 p.m. seven days a week, he said.

The location at the intersection of Church Street and Pamplico Highway is a high-traffic area, Chandler said, adding he owns and operates a Firehouse Subs restaurant nearby.

Jack’s Books is scheduled to launch in the heart of downtown Florence near the end of 2024.

“After a while of being disappointed about it, one morning I just had an epiphany,” Cauthen said. “Instead of complaining about not having one, maybe I should try to do something about it.”

Cauthen believes every city needs an independent bookstore.

He checks for one in every city he visits, but he noticed the hole in Florence. Residents don’t have options other than national chain bookstore Barnes & Noble and book sections in other big box stores.

Florence had independent bookstores in the late 1990s and early 2000s, Downtown Development Manager Hannah Davis said.

Recent years haven’t produced a new store despite Florence's active literary arts community with events such as the annual Local Author Takeover.

“We kind of lost that sense of place with the local readership,” Davis said. “People who are avid readers want that tangible experience.”

Cauthen wants Jack’s Books to fill the gap for book lovers and casual readers.

Jack’s Books will be a unique local spot for book lovers and new readers, Cauthen said. The smaller setting and local management will give Cauthen the opportunity to curate the store’s selection of both new and used books.

The store will break away from a big box store’s cookie cutter appearance. Instead, Cauthen wants to offer something visitors can only find in Florence.

“The reason I think everywhere, and Florence especially, needs one is that it’s just a special place,” Cauthen said. “It has a special role in the community, a way of bringing people together in a unique way that other stores don’t.”

FLORENCE, S.C. (WMBF) - The Creekside restaurant in Florence exclusively shared security video with WMBF News that shows what led up to a drive-by shooting at the establishment over the weekend.

The footage shows the suspect, later identified as 26-year-old Dwayne Cooley, as his body language got more aggressive during an argument with security while he was being asked to leave.

“There was a cover charge that night, and he didn’t want to pay the cover charge,” said Lori Creel, a co-owner of the restaurant.

After Cooley left, arrest warrants state he fired shots at the building as he drove away. He then allegedly came back and opened fire again - this time shattering a window at the restaurant and grazing a customer with a bullet.

“I don’t see anything else I could have done to prevent this,” said Creel. “I have put every measure in place. I’m doing what I can do to provide a safe place. I hope it doesn’t deter anyone from coming out or continuing to prove this place for the community.”

Creekside said they take their customer’s safety seriously. Creel said everyone gets a pat down from her SLED-certified officers and their IDs scanned before getting in.

They also have several cameras monitoring the building, which caught the whole incident on video. These are all protocols and tech which Creel said helped investigators find and arrest Cooley after the shooting, at a nearby nightclub.

“We have done everything we know to do to keep this environment safe. In fact, after the incident happened, we pulled our cameras, pulled our ID scanner to find the individual that had done this, and helped give all of that over to the authorities so that he could be caught and he was that evening,” she said.

Creekside regulars who spoke to WMBF News also said they’ve never felt threatened inside and will continue to come back even after the scare. They also praised the tech that helped authorities track down Cooley.

“I definitely feel safe in this place, but it makes me fearful for the public,” said Clifton Craig.

“I was kind of amazed that something like that could even happen here, you know with the measures they take... They normally keep it pretty tight around here,” said Evan Defe.

The owners, on the other hand, said they’re just thankful everyone will be okay.

“We had higher forces looking over us that night. Because it could have been way, way worse than what it was,” said Creel.

The victim sustained minor injuries and is okay.

Records show Cooley posted a $15,500 bond Monday and was charged with shooting into a dwelling as well as driving under suspension.

Stay with WMBF News for updates.

Copyright 2024 WMBF. All rights reserved.

The stadium is next to the American Legion Field. All the high school football teams in the city would play in the stadium at one point during the seasons when Florence School District 1 leased it.

The stadium hosted its last football game during the 2020 season. A referendum in 2019 was approved and meant new stadiums would be built for Wilson, West and South Florence high schools.

The school district stopped leasing the stadium in 2020 after 50 years and after it funded numerous improvements to the stadium, including a new grandstand and dressing room for visiting teams.

“Most people who were born and raised here in Florence, they do (have a personal connection),” Mayor Theresa Myers Ervin said. “If you attended high school somewhere here in Florence, and if you attended a game, you went to Memorial Stadium.”

The city is working to get the property appraised before considering what to do with it. The stadium was built in 1949 for $75,000 and was leased by the school district for $5,000 a year. The county and city also put money toward maintaining it, which costs a total of $40,000 a year.

The county doesn’t have any apparent use for the stadium for now, Florence County Administrator Kevin Yokim said.

The stadium since then has been primarily used by the Wilson High School Alumni Association for their homecoming week celebrations, which Alumni Association President Mark Bailey said is growing every year.

A Florence-based youth travel football league has also expressed interest in using the field, whether it be through buying or leasing it.

Ervin said one of her children played football and another performed in the band at one football game at the stadium. Bailey also played football for Wilson High School at Memorial Stadium but had to stop due to an injury.

Interim City Manager Scotty Davis’s son played in the stadium he referred to as the premier location for football in Florence for decades.

Jack’s Books is scheduled to launch in the heart of downtown Florence near the end of 2024.

“After a while of being disappointed about it, one morning I just had an epiphany,” Cauthen said. “Instead of complaining about not having one, maybe I should try to do something about it.”

Cauthen believes every city needs an independent bookstore.

He checks for one in every city he visits, but he noticed the hole in Florence. Residents don’t have options other than national chain bookstore Barnes & Noble and book sections in other big box stores.

Florence had independent bookstores in the late 1990s and early 2000s, Downtown Development Manager Hannah Davis said.

Recent years haven’t produced a new store despite Florence's active literary arts community with events such as the annual Local Author Takeover.

“We kind of lost that sense of place with the local readership,” Davis said. “People who are avid readers want that tangible experience.”

Cauthen wants Jack’s Books to fill the gap for book lovers and casual readers.

Jack’s Books will be a unique local spot for book lovers and new readers, Cauthen said. The smaller setting and local management will give Cauthen the opportunity to curate the store’s selection of both new and used books.

The store will break away from a big box store’s cookie cutter appearance. Instead, Cauthen wants to offer something visitors can only find in Florence.

“The reason I think everywhere, and Florence especially, needs one is that it’s just a special place,” Cauthen said. “It has a special role in the community, a way of bringing people together in a unique way that other stores don’t.”