In the news on October 28, 1915 in Kingstree, SC was the first Williamsburg County Fair. To me, that is a pretty big deal. I am not sure if the fair is still operating and I could not find an announcement that it was, but when I was growing up the fair was quite a big deal in South Carolina towns. The fact that many Lake City “folk” travelled to the fair demonstrates how big of a deal the fair was during that time as well.
This news item was placed in “The County Record”, the newspaper of Kingstree, SC. I have driven through Kingstree and have even stopped into a McDonald’s there. The town is actually the county seat of my wife’s hometown, so the area is very familiar tour family. I placed this little column from the paper because it represents a wonderful part of old newspapers that are no longer a part of newer newspapers. This column of “Lake City News Items” is basically the little bits of activity that the reporter compiled about what was going on in the city. Further down in the column you would find out that “Miss Mayme Green was in Kingstree Friday Evening” or “Mrs. L H Jennings of Bishopville is spending a few days at home.”
This is a different kind of local reporting. I am sure that some would consider it an intrusion of privacy, but I somehow believe that the people told the reporter the ends and outs of their lives, for the purpose of printing in the paper. This little column demonstrates the beauty of the old local paper. The reason why they were read was to see what other were doing and—just maybe—to see their own name listed in the news.
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Attached story from: The county record. (Kingstree, S.C.), 28 Oct. 1915. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress. <http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn93067841/1915-10-28/ed-1/seq-1/>