The John de la Howe School

Posted 9/5/18

A story about change

This is the first part in a 3 part series.

When I first heard that aristocratic four-word name, “John de la Howe,” I sensed something monumental, a nobleman, …

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The John de la Howe School

Posted

A story about change

This is the first part in a 3 part series.
When I first heard that aristocratic four-word name, “John de la Howe,” I sensed something monumental, a nobleman, perhaps. 
Later, I heard of the John de la Howe School, not just John de la Howe as locals referred to it. 
A school for orphans it was, and members of my Georgia church collected Christmas gifts for them. I was glad my church was helping children without homes. John de la Howe was, indeed, noble.
Then I grew up, and the winds of fate blew me deep into the blazing Midlands of South Carolina. Later, another wind blew me into the world of books, magazines, and newspapers, and I underwent a metamorphosis. 
A desire to better know this region consumed me and I can tell you the one thing that is as true as the sky is blue. Things change.
The first time I stood by John de la Howe’s walled, roofless grave, a tree grew up through it. The roof collapsed I thought. Later, I learned his will decreed it have no roof. 
The second time I stood by his grave, I sensed why. 
Any seed that might drift in stood a chance of growing. The man believed in giving things a chance to grow, and among those things were the homeless seeds of humanity—orphans. He envisioned an agricultural education for them, and on the heavy iron door to his sepulcher you’ll see the embossed words “Agriculturalis Seminar.” He saw it through.
Well, what we know about the man is this. Dr. John de la Howe immigrated to Charleston in 1760 and began a medical practice. 
He bought land in the Abbeville District, part of which is now McCormick County, and established a farm and home in the wilderness. 
His will decreed that his estate become an agricultural seminary, a home where orphans could acquire a pragmatic education and skills useful over a lifetime. 
The years rolled by, decades rolled by, and the John de la Howe School educated thousands of children. 
And it did something else. It gave young people whose families could not or would not care for them a home. (Hear them tell their story, and you may need a tissue.) They grew up and met success in agriculture, the military, business, education, and fields beyond the green acres of farmland. Mission accomplished.
Blissfully ignorant I was. Growing up on the border, I traveled South Carolina’s graveled roads as a young man and all I remember is piney woods isolation and cold beers from a juke joint, which burned. For two summers in the late 1960s I worked at Georgia’s Elijah Clark State Park, which sits on Clarks Hill Lake across from South Carolina. 
I was one of the garbage men. We went from campsite to campsite on a Massey Ferguson tractor pulling a wooden trailer. 
We’d empty trash cans into the trailer and dump it in a trench in backwoods and set it afire. 
Now and then, for lunch, we garbage men would leave dry Lincoln County for icy red cans of Carling Black Label we could legally buy in Bordeaux. 
With beers and chili dogs in a greasy paper sack, we’d head toward Georgia and eat lunch on the South Carolina side at a picnic spot no longer there. 
We’d sit and eat and sip, oblivious to the deep history that surrounded us. 
The eyes of the man see things differently. 
Today, historical markers hold more interest than beer signs. On Gettys Road you’ll see a marker, “John de la Howe School,” the oldest state institution in South Carolina and the second oldest in the Carolinas. 
Those in the know recognize it as America’s oldest manual training foundation. Hold onto that thought as I tell you in Part II what surrounds this school’s 1,310 acres. 
It’s a land Indians, pioneers, and French Huguenots walked.

down south, tom poland, john de la howe school

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