Preservation Society Book & Gift Shop Holds Book Signing

Event Details

The Preservation Society of Charleston will hold an afternoon book signing for the recently released Plantations, Pineland Villages, Pinopolis and Its People on Saturday, March 24, 2007, from 2-4 p.m. in the Society’s Book & Gift Shop, 147 King Street, Charleston, SC. Our guests will include the author and photographer, Dr. Norman Walsh, as well as the book’s researcher, Cecy Guerry. More information on the book is available on our website at www.preservationsociety.org .

Please visit our Book & Gift Shop on Saturday, March 24, 2007 for a special book signing with Dr. Norman Sinkler Walsh, author and photographer, and researcher, Cecy Guerry for the newly released 'Plantations, Pineland Villages, Pinopolis and Its People'. They will be available to meet and sign copies of their book from 2pm-4pm.


'Pinopolis today is more of a suburb of Moncks Corner, South Carolina, than a Low-Country village, but in 1834, it was a pineland retreat for plantation owners and their families. The planters of St. John’s Parish, particularly the mid-section, built summer homes for “removal” to the pines. Pinopolis founders Dr. Morton Waring, William Cain, and Frederick A. Porcher shared a way of life defined by their aristocratic heritage and their agricultural pursuits. Pinopolis grew from a cluster of two or three simple, wooden structures tucked down sandy roads to a community of over forty homes complete with school and church.

The residents of the pineland of Pinopolis were all connected through family or marriage. Mazyck, Ravenel, Porcher, Deveaux, Gaillard, Dwight, Lucas, Macbeth, Cain, Harvey and Dennis were names repeated as homes were built, and the village became a community. The roles played by Pinopolis and other pineland villages like Pineville, Cordesville and the Barrows were integral to the historical development of the Low Country.

Dr. Norman Walsh presents both a historical perspective of the pineland village and the plantations by which they were supported, as well as a personal glimpse into the families of these villages and their way of life. The historical becomes the personal with Walsh as he reflects upon his childhood years spent growing up in Pinopolis. Utilizing his skills as a photographer, Walsh has captured the feel of family and community that made Pinopolis unique. As Walsh says, “I attempt in this book to preserve some of the past with words and photographic images.”

For some readers, 'Plantations, Pineland Villages, Pinopolis and Its People' will serve as a historical resource. For others, it will preserve memories and introduce a way of life that has long since faded.' – Cecy Guerry