LIFESTYLE
Connecting People To The River story by Jennifer Howard
THE BLACK RIVER INITIATIVE The Pee Dee is defined by rivers. Flowing around working farms and forestlands, through cities, and under highway bridges, they serve as a silent reminder that we were all once a part of the ocean to which our rivers flow. They moved goods and people and gave rise to economies that now exist only as tidal waters among earthen dikes. Tucked between the massive basins of the Santee and the Great Pee Dee, the Black River runs 150 miles connecting Sumter, Lee, Clarendon, Williamsburg, and Georgetown Counties as a thin blue line on a map, flanked by bottomland forests and row crop fields. Locals – and a few others - know that there is more to the tannin-stained waters of the Black than can be seen on a map. In its glassy stillness, ancient cypress trees reflect a water-color self-portrait, occasionally shadowed by the soaring of a swallow-tailed kite. And the river offers an eerie silence interrupted only by the chatter of invisible songbirds and the pileated’s precision drumming. These experiences are what conservation partners, state agencies, and local governments are working to share through a grassroots effort, the Black River Water Trail and Park Network. “The Black River initiative is about connections. It’s about connecting people to the river and it’s about connecting sites along the river,” remarks Pee Dee native, Dr. Maria Whitehead who is leading planning on behalf of the Open Space Institute and the broader conservation partnership. A 70-mile stretch along the river, designated a State Scenic River twenty years ago, will provide a network of boat landings, parks, and preserves designed to support communities by increasing access and creating economic opportunities through nature-based tourism.
Mac Stone Photography
Maria Whitehead Photography
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VIPMagSC.com
May 2021
“As a local land trust, supporting the Black River is personal to us,” remarked Lyles Cooper, executive director of the Pee Dee Land Trust. “Our families swim, fish, and paddle this river and we all reap the benefits of the private landowners who so generously choose to protect these precious resources on their properties through permanent conservation easements.” In addition to conservation
