Editor’s note: This is part of a continuing series of columns, stories and photos by Greenville County Historical Society examining the history of Greenville and the Upstate.

One of the most persistent myths about South Carolina history is that slavery belonged to the Lowcountry, while the Upcountry stood somehow apart from it. Charleston had the plantations, the rice fields and enormous enslaved populations. Greenville and the foothills, many people still assume, were different.

They were different. But they were not separate.

By 1860, nearly 35 percent of Greenville County’s population was enslaved. Thousands of African Americans lived and labored throughout the county, not only on larger farms but in homes, mills, hotels, workshops and construction projects. Enslaved people built roads, maintained property, prepared food, cared for children, and created much of the wealth that helped establish early Greenville.

Slavery was not peripheral to the local economy. It was woven into much of daily life.

Vardry McBee offers one of the clearest examples. After purchasing more than 11,000 acres around the village in 1815 – the original deed is on display at the Greenville County Historical Society – McBee helped develop mills, businesses, churches and commercial enterprises that accelerated Greenville’s growth. Those operations depended heavily on enslaved labor. Many of the men who shaped Greenville’s civic, religious and political leadership were enslavers themselves. Difference from the Lowcountry did not mean distance from slavery.

Outside influences strengthened these ties. Wealthy coastal families began traveling to Greenville during the summer months, seeking cooler weather and relief from disease outbreaks along the coast. They brought investment, social connections, and the assumptions of the plantation South with them. Greenville became increasingly tied, economically and culturally, to the broader slaveholding world around it.

For much of the 20th century, public memory in Greenville emphasized progress, industry and civic growth while saying relatively little about the enslaved people whose labor made much of that development possible. That silence helped shape what many residents still believe about the Upcountry’s origins.

The Upcountry did not stand outside the slave South. It occupied a different place within it. Understanding Greenville’s early history honestly means placing slavery near the center of the story – not as a footnote, but as part of the foundation on which the community was built.

Next: Lowcountry planter families retreat to Greenville for seasonal relief from heat, disease.

Russell Stall is a Greenville native, former at-large Greenville City Council member, and certified city planner. He serves as executive director of the Greenville County Historical Society. For more information, visit greenvillehistory.org.

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Editor’s note: This is part of a continuing series of columns, stories and photos by Greenville County Historical Society examining the history of Greenville and the Upstate.

If Richard Pearis represents Greenville’s uncertain beginnings, Vardry McBee represents something very different: direction.
The first paper ever presented to the Greenville County Historical Society, in 1961, focused on McBee – and for good reason. Few people shaped this city more deliberately or more deeply.

When McBee purchased more than 11,000 acres from Lemuel James Alston in 1815, Greenville was still a small courthouse village with little to suggest it would become the economic and cultural center of the Upcountry. McBee saw possibilities that others did not. He understood water power, transportation routes and geography long before Greenville became a city.

Born in 1775 near present-day Gaffney, McBee came from a family whose finances had been badly damaged during the Revolutionary War. He received little formal education, apprenticed as a saddler in Lincolnton, North Carolina, and gradually built a reputation as a merchant with unusual discipline and financial judgment. By the time he turned his attention to Greenville, he had already proven himself.

He spent decades laying what we might call the infrastructure of ambition. He built mills along the Reedy River, operated stores, invested in roads and railroads, and promoted Greenville as a place of commerce and stability. In 1820 he donated land for the Greenville Male and Female Academies. He gave land for churches that still anchor downtown today — Christ Church Episcopal, First Baptist, Buncombe Street Methodist, First Presbyterian. He later supported the founding of Furman University and backed the railroad connection to Columbia completed in 1853.

But Greenville’s early growth came with contradictions that deserve to be named. McBee was not simply a civic benefactor. By 1860 he had become the district’s largest enslaver, holding fifty-six people in bondage according to the federal census. The prosperity he built, and the city that prosperity made possible, rested on that foundation.

Greenville still reflects systems McBee helped put into place. The city’s growth was never accidental. From the beginning, it was shaped by a remarkably small circle of landowners, merchants, and financiers who controlled both the economy and civic life. That concentration of power set patterns that have never fully disappeared.

The questions Greenville still wrestles with – who benefits from growth, whose stories get told, whose labor gets counted – trace directly back to this period. McBee gave Greenville direction. What we do with that inheritance is still being decided.

Next: The role of enslaved people in the founding and building of Greenville.

Russell Stall is a Greenville native, former at-large Greenville City Council member, and certified city planner. He serves as executive director of the Greenville County Historical Society. For more information, visit greenvillehistory.org.

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Editor’s note: This is the fourth in a continuing series of columns, stories and photos by Greenville County Historical Society examining the history of Greenville and the Upstate.

Most people around here have at least heard the name Richard Pearis, the man who claimed land along the Reedy River and who is often called Greenville’s first white settler. For those who haven’t heard the full story, it’s worth a brief telling, because it sounds like a beginning, even if it didn’t become one.

Pearis arrived in the South Carolina backcountry in the mid-18th century, when this region was still largely Cherokee land. He worked as a trader and interpreter, moving between colonial settlers and the Cherokee, and he married into Cherokee society. His Cherokee wife, Patchy, often described as the daughter of a Cherokee leader, gave him access, influence and a working knowledge of the foothills that few outsiders possessed. The historical record is less certain about whether he maintained a separate European wife at the same time.

After the Anglo-Cherokee War, treaties forced the Cherokee to cede large portions of land to colonial authorities. Pearis moved quickly, claiming thousands of acres along the Reedy, including land near what is now downtown Greenville. On paper, he had the ingredients of a founder: land, relationships, timing and vision.

But the ground beneath him was never stable.

Pearis did not establish a town or a lasting community. What he created was a foothold in a place that remained remote, contested and unsettled. His position depended on fragile relationships between Cherokee communities, colonial governments and a frontier still being reshaped by force. He could move between worlds, but he never fully belonged to either one.

Then came the American Revolutionary War, and everything shifted. Pearis sided with the British as a Loyalist. When the Patriots prevailed, his land was confiscated, his influence collapsed, and his claims along the Reedy vanished. The settlement he imagined never took hold.

That’s why it may be more useful to see Pearis not as Greenville’s founder but as its first failed attempt.

Even the way we remember him reflects that ambiguity. In 1962, the Greenville County Historical Society proposed renaming Paris Mountain to “Pearis Mountain.” The proposal never took hold.

Pearis’s story reminds us that early Greenville was not a clear beginning. It was uncertain, improvised and shaped by plans that did not always last.

Next: We turn to the story of Vardry McBee, the man who did more than anyone else to shape early Greenville, using land, capital, religion and paternal authority to lay the foundations of the town that followed.

Russell Stall is a Greenville native, former at-large Greenville City Council member, and certified city planner. He serves as executive director of the Greenville County Historical Society. For more information, visit greenvillehistory.org.

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Related – Photos: 2026 Artisphere VIP Party

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Minihan has 14 years of collegiate coaching experience and was head coach of the USC Upstate women’s team from 2012 to  ’16. After stepping away from coaching, she earned a masters degree in human resource development. She has worked as an athletic consultant and is a certified CoreClarity facilitator.

The Liberty were founded in 2021. The club is owned by Greenville Pro Soccer along with the Greenville Triumph, a men’s professional team which plays in USL League One.

The team will play at the under-construction GE Vernova Park at BridgeWay Station in Mauldin. The stadium is expected to open in June.

“When I think about the history of this team, the past few years have been spent building a team. … There is this wonderful foundation to launch from,” Minihan said.

“I want to win but also want to play well, and I want to develop these young ladies to be outstanding human beings and great citizens.”

The Liberty have competed for the past four seasons in the pre-professional USL W League, but this season will play a six-game, under-20 schedule in June and July. Future league plans for the Liberty have not been announced.

As a player, Minihan was a four-year starter at Michigan from 1999 to 2003 and was named to the all-Big Ten conference first team three times. She was drafted by Atlanta in the now-defunct WUSA and went on to play professionally in Charlotte and Boston.

Minihan, a Greenville County resident, returned to youth coaching in 2022.

“I stepped away in 2016 from coaching collegiately after having my kids, and just really spent a lot of time away from the game but was developing in other areas,” Minihan said.

“But everything I was working on kept coming back to coaching.”

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“I’m really looking forward to working alongside Sporting Director Zach Prince to build a championship caliber team for the community and our great fan base, and to make more history as we move into GE Vernova Park,” Dixon said in a Dec. 17 news release.

Dixon served as assistant coach of Charlotte Independence in 2019 and ’20, and again for the 2024 and ’25 seasons. Charlotte plays in USL League One along with the Triumph. He also served as director of soccer for FC Carolina from 2021-24. He has 29 years of coaching experience at the professional, collegiate and developmental levels. He was a goalkeeper during his playing career at Houghton College and professionally with the Charlotte Eagles, which competes in USL League Two.

Dixon is the Triumph’s third head coach. John Harkes led the team from its founding in 2018 until ’23. Rick Wright coached the club the past two seasons before retiring. The Triumph won the USL League One championship in 202o and finished as runners-up in 2019 and ’21.

Greenville Pro Soccer, owner of the Greenville Triumph SC and the USL W League Greenville Liberty, is currently building a 4,300-seat stadium at BridgeWay Station in Mauldin. Construction is expected to be completed in 2026. It will have a total capacity of 6,300 and serve as home field for the Triumph and Liberty. The club announced GE Vernova as the stadium naming sponsor on Nov. 15.

The club has transitioned leadership on several levels over the past several months. Chris Lewis stepped down as team president Dec. 4 after leading the club since it launched in 2018. Prince was hired Dec. 8 as the club’s general manager and sporting director.

Founder and chairman Joe Erwin stepped down in late summer but retained an ownership stake and remained on the club’s board. Wallace Cheves, part of a group of new investors in the club in 2024, took over as chairman of Greenville Pro Soccer in September.

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Lewis joined the club when it was founded in 2018. Under his leadership, the Triumph began play in USL League One in 2019 and won the league title the following year. The Liberty, a pre-professional women’s team playing in the USL W League, was launched in 2022. Lewis was previously president and general manager of the Greenville Swamp Rabbits hockey team from 2012 to ’18.

“I am incredibly grateful for the trust placed in me and proud of what we have accomplished together,” Lewis said. “The passion of our supporters and the strength of this community give me full confidence that the clubs are poised for even more success.”

Greenville Pro Soccer is currently building a 4,300-seat stadium at BridgeWay Station in Mauldin, with construction expected to be completed in 2026. It will have a total capacity of 6,300 and serve as home field for the Triumph and Liberty. The club announced GE Vernova as the stadium naming sponsor on Nov. 15.

The Lewis announcement is the second major leadership change for the club in recent months. Founder and chairman Joe Erwin stepped down earlier this year, though he retained an ownership stake and remained on the club’s board. Wallace Cheves, part of a group of new investors in the club in 2024, took over as chairman of Greenville Pro Soccer.

“Chris has been a driving force behind what Greenville Triumph and Liberty have become — from our early days building a front office to launching our inaugural seasons and helping us establish a permanent home for our fans,” Cheves said. “On behalf of our entire ownership group, we thank Chris for his leadership, vision and tireless dedication to creating something special for Greenville soccer.”

There was no immediate announcement of a replacement for Lewis.

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Local conservation organization Upstate Forever had organized a trip to Jocassee Gorges to highlight the rare Oconee Bell, found in a few secluded pockets of the Upstate and almost nowhere else. It flowers for a few weeks in early spring and otherwise blends quietly into the forest flora.

As someone fond of both wandering in the woods and photographing flowers, this was not a difficult assignment. I was primed to enjoy the tour before I pulled into the parking lot.

But there was Dennis – and beloved wife Jane, who was always by his side – leading the expedition and spinning knowledgeable yarns about the slice of the Blue Ridge he called home. He was raised in Pickens County and lived near Table Rock. White-bearded, wearing a ballcap and leaning on a tall walking stick, he answered all my questions before I could ask. A good moment got better.

My abiding recollection of the day is casually chatting with Dennis and Jane after the walk-and-talk. Dennis asked me if I’d ever been to Jumping Off Rock. Having moved to the area just nine months prior, I had not.

We were already a few miles inside Jocassee Gorges Wilderness Area and he implied I was practically there. If I was this close, I had to go on up the road and see it, he said.

If you’ve never been to Jumping Off Rock, high on a ridge above the northeast portion of Lake Jocassee, it is difficult to explain how much Dennis was misrepresenting “close.” The grand overlook is among the more remote public places in the Upstate still accessible by “road.”

(I use quotes here because the road in question is nothing more than miles of loose, single-track gravel, some of it quite steep and none of it appropriate for my tiny hatchback.)

And yet … Dennis was right. Jumping Off Rock was a wondrous sight. I had the whole view to myself on a midweek afternoon. It was glorious, made finer by the unexpected journey.

Dennis lived a beautiful life and helped others do the same. On the morning of Nov. 21, 2025, he passed away peacefully at his home with Jane nearby.

For many years, he shared his love of the Upstate’s wonders. How many did he encourage to wander a little farther in the woods, to listen to the rhythm of nature, and to see why preserving one special corner of the world was a worthy lifetime task?

How many value this place a little more because of Dennis Chastain?

I met Dennis only a handful of times in person, but editing his column every two weeks put me at the front of the line for what was on his mind. It was an honor to edit “Field Notes” for the Greenville Journal. I’m going to miss the folksy turns of phrase, woodsy wisdom, practical advice and nostalgic tangents. Our readers will, too.

Farewell, Dennis, and thank you.

Ryan Gilchrest is the editor of Greenville Journal and director of content for Community Journals. 

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Odom, best known for his iconic turn as Aaron Burr in the original Broadway cast of “Hamilton,” hit the stage of Peace Concert Hall in downtown Greenville Nov. 30, the third stop on a 17-city schedule. The music barely waned for 90 minutes of a tight 20-song set.

The show opened with a restrained and poignant “Have yourself a Merry Little Christmas,” but ranged into jazz, pop and gospel. The highlight of the show – aside from a thrilling moment in the encore that should not be spoiled – was a stripped-down, gospel-blues version of “Please Come Home for Christmas” accompanied by a keyboard mimicking church organ to perfection.

Odom headlined with style but the four-piece Galaxy Defenders backing band made fresh fans. A particular standout was Chris Cadenhead on keys, whose improvisational vibe with Odom was a hit in the hall. Three members of the band have worked together for decades and it comes through in the music – soaring, sharing the moment and tightly transitioning to the next number.

As the show progressed into the third act, Odom made a costume change from loose, bronzy-brown robes to a crimson suit. His stage actor persona took over late in the show with a recital of “A Visit from St. Nicholas” followed by two Christmas classics sung in their native languages – a virtuosic tour-de-force from the Tony-award winner.

The Greenville show seemed especially personal to Odom, and for good reason. He has family in South Carolina, about two dozen of whom greeted him backstage after the performance.

Family or not, the sold-out crowd was enthralled throughout. Odom mixed in a few chats with the audience, led a sing-along or two, and generally captivated in a way few performers can.

“The Christmas Tour” swung through Florida after Greenville, and heads to New York state and the Midwest next. A stop in Atlanta is set for Dec. 15, the best chance for anyone in the Upstate to catch Odom if they missed the Greenville show. The tour wraps up in Beaver Creek, Colorado on Dec. 23.

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Course architect Andrew Green gave a tour of the progress on Sept. 18. He was joined by founding partner Scott Ferrell and superintendent of agronomy David Barrett. Fairway areas have been cleared on the 290-acre site, which borders the west bank of the Reedy River near the intersection of S.C. Highway 418 and Fork Shoals Road. About 100 acres of the site will remain undeveloped, including the stretch along the river.

Read more about the Kawonu Golf Club

The course will be private, with plans to cap the membership at 500. It will play at about 7,300 yards from the championship tees and roughly 5,000 yards from the front tees.

It is expected to open in 2027. For more information, visit kawonugolfclub.com.

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He may also have needed a ride home.

“I parked and I forgot to pay,” said Jeremy Watkins, 45, while celebrating on the concourse at Fluor Field with his three sons. Before the event started, he found out from his wife that his car was being towed.

“My car got towed but we won!” said an exuberant Watkins shortly after his key was the one that unlocked the grand prize.

The event was part of a wider celebration of the Drive’s 20th season. The team is a High-A minor league baseball affiliate of the Red Sox.

Seven Drive fans, chosen at random from the past four home games, competed during the first six innings to win keys. Each had at least one, and some managed to win a second. It was Watkins’ second key that turned the lock on the ceremonial box filled with balloons and a giant “6.”

Watkins is a Drive season ticket holder who moved to Greenville in 2017. He said the family has not previously been to Boston and they were excited about the trip.

The full grand prize package won by Watkins includes:

• Trip for four to Boston, including airfare and hotel
• Four tickets to a Boston Red Sox game
• Greenville Drive 2026 season tickets
• A chance to throw out the first pitch at a future Drive game
• A Drive jersey with their last name and “6M” on the back
• A 20th anniversary baseball signed by the Drive team

He will also be featured in the Drive’s “Our Home Team” billboard ad campaign.

The six runners-up received a $100 gift card and tickets to next season’s home opener. They were: Christopher Hamilton, 10; Harvey Hewens, 66; Joe Lysea, 61; Jordan Moore Wright, 22; Danni Stoughton, 24; and Brenda Vertone, 64.

Fluor Field is located at 945 S. Main St. in Greenville’s West End.

Related: The Greenville Drive celebrate their 20th year

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By any measure, Greenville is a success story. We’re a city known for turning bold ideas into reality, like the revitalization of our downtown. And while we’ve grown and prospered, we now face a pivotal moment: Will we become a city that ignores those experiencing homelessness, or will we come together to support our neighbors and work toward real, lasting solutions?

Many of our neighbors are unhoused not because they’ve failed, but because our systems have. Homelessness can happen suddenly and unexpectedly. Too many people in our community are one personal hardship away from experiencing homelessness. This risk is worsened by housing shortages, policy gaps and under-resourced support systems.

Despite common misconceptions, many people experiencing homelessness in Greenville are working. At the men’s shelter on Washington Street, nearly half of the nightly residents go to work every day. They are doing their part and now this community must step up to do ours.

The postponement on June 9 of the city of Greenville’s proposed camping ordinance gives us a chance to do just that. We commend city leadership for pausing to engage with others, because now is not the time to rush to enforcement. It’s time to invest in coordination, compassion and community-informed solutions.

This is exactly what Greenville Together: A Home for All is designed to do and is already working toward. This citywide initiative brings together nonprofits, the city of Greenville, business leaders and people with lived experience to make homelessness rare, brief and non-recurring. Our long-term goal is functional zero: a system where homelessness is quickly
identified and resolved, and no one is left behind.

Importantly, the city has already shown commitment, investing $500,000 in the upcoming budget toward our total goal of $4.8 million. By the end of 2025, we aim to rehouse 80 households currently living unsheltered: 50 through immediate placement and 30 with wraparound stability support. Our housing surge is a citywide push to increase permanent
housing options. We have plenty of temporary shelter beds, but not enough permanent supportive housing options for people to transition to from shelters.

The postponement of the city’s ordinance is critical because this work doesn’t start with enforcement – it starts with listening, building trust and meeting needs. It starts with housing that is safe, affordable and supported by services for mental health, employment and recovery.

Homelessness is a real and growing issue in Greenville, but this community has always risen to meet big challenges. Let’s use this time to engage deeply, think long-term, and stay focused on real solutions, because everyone deserves a safe place to call home.

Now is our chance to show what’s possible when we work for the benefit of every neighbor — together. Learn more or get involved at greenvilletogether.org.

Carl Sobocinski is founder and president of Table 301 Hospitality. Sean Dogan is senior pastor of Long Branch Baptist Church.

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Related: Spartanburgers inaugural home game hints at impact city’s downtown

The late afternoon sun filled the park as families and people of all ages watched the Spartanburgers shine in a 5-3 victory over the visiting Bowling Green Hot Rods.

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