Lone Star

It was a beautiful summer afternoon in South Carolina Tuesday, perfect for being out on rural backroads, consulting my map frequently, and making my way toward the little ghost town of Lone Star. Actually, people live in the town or community, I should say, but the tiny business district consists of five abandoned buildings and one classic brick structure, now the magistrate’s office, which is the only building that appears to have any future staying power. The rest are gradually deteriorating, although there was a general store in one of them the last time I was there two years ago. The door is now padlocked. The 40s-era gasoline pumps in front of another store are rusting and surrounded by weeds. A sign in the window of the magistrate’s office says, “No concealed weapons allowed inside.”

I wrote about this small, and now inconsequential, town in one of my earliest diary entries more than a year ago. I described an old, abandoned house on the outside of town, still standing, its two twin turrets ertect, but the whole ediface keeling over at a rather ominous angle. Tuesday, I looked for the old ruin and found instead a large, kudzo-covered pile of rubble. I didn’t realize it would be gone so soon.

The first time I visited Lone Star was on a backroads trip with a friend from Columbia in 1974. We were photographing whatever we thought looked interesting, taking black and white pictures and later developing them in a darkroom, excited each time an image magically appeared in the chemical tray on 5×7 or 8×10 inch photo paper. Lone Star provided subject matter you very seldom come across, then or now. A view of the town from across the railroad tracks, which once ran through the center of town, hangs on my dining room wall. I look at it a lot. I try to imagine what life was like when it was a prosperous stop on the railroad line more than a century ago. It was around the mid to late 1880s that the rails came to many a small South Carolina town, ensuring that it would survive at least to a respectable size, enough to make it a market town for the surrounding farms. Lone Star was probably one of those, but a very minor trading hub, passed up for anything greater by other towns that were perhaps a bit for fortuitously situated geographically.

I don’t know why I’m so drawn to this particular place. Why I keep coming back every few years. Soon, I expect that the brick mercantile building will be all that’s left. Another 10, 15 years left for the rest of it. Maybe less, maybe more.

I’ve tried to research the town’s history, but so far I can find nothing of any consquence in the county histories I’ve looked at. I’m working on it, though, and I know that some information on its history is out there somewhere. I hope to find it.

Upon reflecting on the curious name of the town, and whether it has anything to do with Texas, I think there might be a connection to the Lone Star State, but as I wrote in the earlier entry, I also like to think some dreamer just liked the sound of the two words, “Lone Star.” Something magical happened one night when he saw a bright star, seemingly alone in its vast constellation, until the night darkened fully and the other stars began to come out. Much nicer than to think of it as named for a single star on a big state flag, or however that goes.

Like I say, I’ll find out the meaning of the name one day, and more about the town, but I may well be disillusiioned by the discovery, as well as by other things I might find out.