Description: Venture off the beaten path to forgotten roads, where a hidden South Carolina exists. Time-travel and dead-end at a ferry that leads to wild islands. Cross a rusting steel truss bridge into a scene from the 1930s. Behold an old gristmill and imagine its creaking, clashing gears grinding corn. See an old gas pump wreathed in honeysuckle. Drive through a ghost town and wonder why it died. When's the last time you saw a country store's cured hams hanging from wires? How about a vintage Bull Durham tobacco ad on old brick? Tom Poland explores scenic back roads that lead to heirlooms tomatoes, poke salad, restaurants once gas stations, overgrown ruins and other soulful relics.
Brief description: Tom Poland's work has appeared in magazines throughout the South. Among his recent books are Classic Carolina Road Trips from Columbia, Georgialina, A Southland, As We Knew It and Reflections of South Carolina, Vol. 2. Swamp Gravy, Georgia's Official Folk Life Drama, staged his play, Solid Ground. He writes a weekly column for newspapers and journals in Georgia and South Carolina about the South, its people, traditions, lifestyle and changing culture and speaks to groups across South Carolina and Georgia. Tom grew up in Lincoln County, Georgia, and graduated from the University of Georgia. He lives in Columbia, South Carolina, where he writes about Georgialina, his name for eastern Georgia and South Carolina.
Review Quotes: Poland captures the essence of Rural Life in South Carolina Country Roads. T&D News
Who knew there could be such beauty in train depots, filling stations and other vanishing charms? Tom Poland did. The well-known author, journalist and speaker has proven it in his latest book, South Carolina Country Roads: Of Train Depots, Filling Stations & Other Vanishing Charms.Tom spent the last several years doing the photography and writing for this latest book by driving the backroads of South Carolina. Because he doesn't like being on the interstate, his ventures off the main thoroughfares open up all kinds of possibilities to see what so many, otherwise, would miss. There are hidden treasures in a ghost town, a rusting steel truss bridge that takes the reader back to the 1930s, and an old gas pump covered in honeysuckle. It's not often if ever anymore, you see cured hams hanging from wires at a country store. Talk of the Town WISTV With characteristic modesty, South Carolina author Tom Poland might deny it, but he shares a kindred spirit and eloquence with late New England poet Robert Frost. Both he and Frost have been drawn inexorably to the road "less traveled and that has made the difference" to both of them.He easily persuades like-minded travelers to join him on the way. "The real South Carolina and the South in general is still out there. While it's true that interstates relegated once-busy highways to back-road status, think of that as an act of preservation. The Columbia Star