“Deek” Diedrickson, a builder, designer and advocate for simple living, takes readers into the fascinating world of tiny spaces and the people who inhabit them.
Dawn on Sunday in the Charleston harbor was spectacular, but this photo really doesn’t do justice to the deep violets, lavenders, oranges and yellows that illuminated clouds as a ship steamed toward Wando terminal. In the shot, taken from the 12th floor of the Francis Marion Hotel around 7 a.m., you can see reflections of the sunrise bouncing off the roof of the new basketball arena used by the College of Charleston. At the middle left is the Dockside condominium tower. Photo by Andy Brack.
By Caroline Satchell | When you are a nonprofit nature museum that wants to build a name for itself with limited resources, what do you do? Have one of your animals beg a celebrity to come meet you, of course.
That’s what the Virginia Living Museum (VLM) in Newport News, Va., has done with its groundhog, Chesapeake Chuck. Chuck claims to be the Number One fan of one of Charleston’s celebrity residents – comedian and actor Bill Murray. Chuck has launched a national social media campaign to have Murray join him for Groundhog Day on Feb. 2. To date, the museum’s Bill Murray Facebook posts have reached almost 150,000 people, generated over 4,000 likes and almost 2,000 shares. Comments have come from as far away as Australia. Media have picked up on the story and the Newport News Visitor Center is even helping promote the cause.
By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | Simply put, Tom Johnson is a character — a Georgia-drawling, camellia-addicted, big-hearted, fun-loving, hard-working, straight-talking character.
We tell you this because Johnson, who oversees the country’s largest camellia assortment at Magnolia Plantation and Gardens, is featured as “The Camellia Man” in the latest and 50th anniversary issue of Southern Living (pp. 144-149). In the article, he’s as sassy and fun as we remember during a trip to Cuba with him, wife Mary Ann Johnson and more than a dozen others last August.
By Kyra Morris, contributing editor | “Coming Together” is the theme of Charleston’s newly-elected mayor, John Tecklenburg. Charleston does not just represent the formal city of Charleston but the whole tri-county area, and coming together in Charleston is not new.
Though Charleston is a shrine to the past,
where every alleyway and weather-worn road
tells the story of a city resurrected;
time is never standing still.
Running beneath the surface
are fault lines of our own making,
reshaping memory brick by brick.
Contributing editor Michael Kaynard sent along this neat photo, but its location might be too obscure without a hint or two. So here it is: It’s in Charleston County and it’s near a park. First person to guess correctly wins a pair of tickets to Magnolia Plantation and Gardens, now filled with beautiful camellias. Send your best guess to: editor@charlestoncurrents.com — and make sure to include the name of the town in which you live.
We Can Do Better, South Carolina! (2019) by editor and publisher Andy Brack offers incisive commentaries on the American South, politics, the common good and interesting South Carolina leaders. Available exclusively for Kindle for $7.99. A paperback version will be ready soon. Learn more.
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