Curiouser and Curiouser

We slept in a little bit this morning and had brunch at the appropriately named Curiosity Coffee Bar, a highly-rated little place just a couple of blocks from the White Rabbit (our Alice-in-Wonderland-themed bnb). Curiouser and curiouser, we spent the rest of the day at the South Carolina State Library. 


The library staff were quite accommodating of our multiple requests from the stacks (I don't have a pic of the big pile of books we left behind at the end of the day). 

The things we're curious about make some people (Kef and Dad specifically) shake their heads. Today's finds included a listing of early settlers to South Carolina, among which was my 5 greats grandfather Samuel McGill, described among the "poor protestants lately arrived from Ireland on the encouragement of the Bounty given by this Province." His age was listed as 23, and he was granted that bounty of 100 acres. Although we knew he was born in Ireland, we didn't know what year. So this 1766 listing from a council meeting gave us his arrival year, approximate birth year, and the township of his land grant. And such is the way of a genealogist... one little listing in an obscure book can move you forward, inch by inch.

map of townships in South Carolina


Another fun find in an equally obscure book was a hand-drawn series of plats from 1759 with... wait for it... names! Haha... the holy grail for a person who wants to stand on the land where their ancestors stood.



This time it was my 6th great grandfather Ulrich Buser (aka Boozer), an immigrant from Switzerland to Saxe-Gotha. I had been hopeful to find more about this interesting little Swiss-German immigrant enclave, and I was not disappointed. I took many pictures of the pages from these books and now just have to go back and read them in detail...there's no time for that in the moment! Anyway, Ulrich's plat is right along the Congaree River, so now I have to try to overlay that hand-drawn map with a current-day map of the river to try to identify what now stands on his land. That's my next to-do after I post this...but before bed so that we can possibly go drive there in the coming days.

It was too cold for mom in the library, so we left a little earlier than we might have (about an hour before closing) and came back to enjoy a nap at the rabbit house. Plus beautiful blooms in their full glory already!


Then we were off to have dinner at another highly-rated local spot, the Ambrosia Taverna. We had really been looking forward to this one because it was a top-rated restaurant in the area AND Greek AND just a couple of blocks from the Rabbit. I have to say we weren't enamored with their takes on moussaka and pastitsio (the spices were a bit off and mom didn't love their addition of red peppers and zucchini to the eggplant in the moussaka), but the ambiance was lovely, the wait staff friendly, and the phyllo trio of appetizers quite nice (although not as good as the saltier, butterier versions that we make, and who puts melted cheese on top of spanikopita and tiropita??). 



Tomorrow's excursion is to the State Archives, and we are very hopeful for more land grant information there...and who knows what else!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

London, Too

Image
Thursday was our day of touring London with a guide on our bus. I've been to many of the key places in London, so I was glad to get a tour that told more about the different areas of the city and how they are changing. The area where our hotel is located is known as the "Silicon Valley" area of London... so you can imagine the people we've seen commuting by foot to work around here. All young(ish). I won't go over all of the places we drove through... if you've been to London you know and if you haven't you can imagine. We stopped at the Methodist Central Hall across from Westminster Abbey for a toilet break and hoping to see the inside. Unfortunately, the hall was booked for a conference and so all we did was have a coffee in the Wesley Cafe and use the toilet. This was one place I didn't get to go the last time I was in London, so I was happy to read a little more about it and go inside, even just for a minute. Central Hall was built
Read more

Epworth

Image
The first stop on our Wesleyan Tour was the small town of Epworth, where John Wesley was raised, baptized and became the man he was. I'm not sure how this town would be if it hadn't been for the Wesleys... it's almost as if they loved to hate Samuel Wesley and his family when they were living, but when they died or went away and became "famous" they became hometown heroes. I guess this would just be any-old little town if it weren't known for the Wesleys. We visited the rectory that was John Wesley's home (rebuit in 1709 after being destroyed by a fire that John himself barely survived). Among the displays there was a listing of what Susannah Wesley's day typically looked like... That's a lot more time for spiritual reflection than I would have thought. I wonder how many mothers of 10 children have a schedule that looks like this? A simpler time perhaps. So far, what I've learned of John Wesley makes me wonder whether I would ha
Read more