Piecing together Columbia's history, 1 glass bottle and newspaper clipping at a time (2024)

COLUMBIA— In South Carolina, the site of the most Revolutionary War battles and the first state to secede from the Union during the Civil War, historical artifacts are plentiful.

The state’s history draws collectors looking for unique finds to add to their collection as well as history buffs intrigued in the stories that surround those items.

Many of them can be found in the state capital, researching, collecting and sharing what they find in the Facebook group, “Columbia History pre 1945."Here, over 600 researchers, collectors and residents post old photographs, findings and information from a pre-WWII Columbia.

Art Gose, 32, an avid bottle collector, created the group in January 2020. He has a collection of nearly 200 glass bottles that once held liquor, manufactured in the state dispensary system during the prohibition period, and from Columbia pharmacies dating as far back as the 1840s.

"I travel the state and dig around old houses, underneath crawl spaces, old barns, attics, you name it," Gose said.

Many of the bottles come from the South Carolina Dispensary era, during which all liquor in South Carolina was bottled and sold through a state-run monopoly. The bottles from this time, which lasted from roughly 1893 to 1907, are treasured by collectors.

"My dad got me into (bottle collecting) in '07," Gose said. "He passed away in '09, and I kind of went full force into promoting the hobby."

When members of the Facebook group post photographs, names or other information for which they need added historical context, Paul Armstrong is their go-to guy.

The 72-year-old Armstrong has become somewhat of an expert on the topic of Columbia history, running his own website where he researches and writes about the city’s history.

A Columbia resident since 1965, he graduated from the University of South Carolina with a master's in management information systems, working at several different companies until he retired in 2018.

Armstrong said he had long been interested in Columbia's history, but he hadn't had the time to pursue his curiosity until his retirement. Around the same time, he started volunteering for Historic Columbia, leading walking and bus tours around the city.

One day, someone with Historic Columbia hosted a seminar showcasing online history resources available to anyone with an internet connection, like public library archives and newspaper databases going back as far as the 1860s, among others.

The days of sifting through microfilm in a dusty library basem*nt were largely over, though Armstrong has done that, too, as certain periods of Columbia's history — notably, much of the Civil War era — are excluded from Columbia newspaper archives.

Though the work is still tedious and challenging, Armstrong, unarmed with any kind of formal history education, said the swath of digitized newspaper archives makes piecing together bits of information considerably less time-consuming and more convenient.

“There's so much online these days for doing research,” Armstrong said. “It's very rare that you have to go to the library to search microfilm anymore.”

John Sherrer, director of preservation at Historic Columbia, said Columbia's long and varied history gives these kinds of local groups a "wealth of information."

"History is not something that is static, it's ever-evolving," Sherrer said. "With more information ... you have the opportunity to have a more comprehensive representation of the past."

Armstrong's research has touched on niche, hyperlocal topics like why Devine Street used to be spelled "Divine" and the history of materials used in paving Columbia's roads. But it has also tackled topics of broader importance and called into question some local myths.

Perhaps mostly notably: Where was Confederate money printed in Columbia? Local tradition has led many to believe that Confederate currency was printed in the historic building at the corner of Gervais and Huger streets, which houses a Publix Supermarket. The building is even labeled as "Confederate Printing Plant" on Google Maps and named as such in the National Register of Historic Places.

But in an article detailing the operations of Columbia-based printing companies contracted by the Confederate government to print their currency, Armstrong strings together eyewitness testimony and other sources suggesting that none of the money was actually printed in that building. It was owned by a company that did print Confederate money, but all of those operations were located on Main Street, Armstrong writes.

Another inaccuracy, Armstrong claims, is a historic marker sitting near the Gervais Street Bridge, which states that the second bridge was built in 1870. “I know maybe this may be a little picky,” Armstrong said, “but it was actually 1872.”

He has even garnered a reputation outside the group.

When someone called the State Museum asking for information about a token from 1909 they found, the museum directed them to Armstrong. “They didn’t know what it was, so I went out and did the research,” Armstrong said.

The coin turned out to be a city-issued license for a drayman, a worker companies often paid to transport goods via large horse carriages to and from railroads and canals.

Sherrer spoke highly of Armstrong's research skills.

"He approaches it with such an incredible dedication, a really a great eye for information," Sherrer said. "Just a highly resourceful individual."