Past - Present - Future

This web site is intended to be a place of reunion, a place of memory and a place of celebration of the town of Glendale and its people. The pressures of modern life make it harder and harder to maintain a sense of community for a town. At the same time, the wonders of the Internet make it possible to establish connections, share stories and information in ways that were impossible in days past. This web site will make it possible for anyone having an interest or emotional tie to Glendale to connect with others with the same interests. We hope that this web site will be a place to renew old friendships, discover relatives who have passed on, meet new cousins, share news about the community and hopefully acquire a new appreciation for the special place that is Glendale.

New Things Are Happening

One of the main reasons for developing this web site is to help publicize the new and exciting things that are starting to happen in Glendale. Join the new organization, the Friends of Glendale that is helping to bring about these changes. Click on the link below to read full details about these things.

New Things in Glendale.

Availability of reports, photos etc. relating to Glendale

B. G. Stephens is a native of Glendale and has been very active in the Friends of Glendale organization and assisting with the various exciting projects that are happening with the the community. He has accumulated a variety of material that  is pertinent to Glendale and the new projects and has arranged to make the material available on this web site. You can see a list of the material he has and gain access to it through links on the page, Glendale Reports.

It All Started With Lawson's Fork Creek

Lawson's Fork Creek is the reason that the present town of Glendale exists where it does. Click on the following link to  read more about the creek and its importance to the story of Glendale.

Lawson's Fork Creek

 

Making Iron on Lawson's Fork

Iron tools and other implements were badly needed by the new settlers. Fortunately, all of the necessary parts of the iron making process were available at the place that was to eventually become the town of Glendale. There was water power to turn a water wheel and power a bellows to operate the furnace. There was iron ore along the banks of the creek. There was limestone available for the digging and there was a vast number of trees to be turned into charcoal. The iron industry was to be very important in the history of Glendale. Click on the link below to read more details about the iron industry and how it affected the history of Glendale.

The Iron Works
Map of Location of Iron Works
Satellite View of Iron Works Location and Glendale

The Revolutionary War and Glendale

The presence of the Iron Works made the vicinity around Glendale a very important place during the Revolutionary War. Click on the following link to read more the War in the Glendale area.

The Battle of Wofford's Iron Works

Early Roads to Glendale

The iron works was served by one of the earliest roads in all of Upstate South Carolina. It was called the "Georgia Road". It was very important during colonial and the Revolutionary War Era and was important to the development of the town. Some of it is still in use today. Click on the followng link for more information.

The Georgia Road

(Glendale Bridge. Picture from Wikipedia)

The Coming of the Textile Mill

Lawson's Fork Creek was not the site of the first textile mills in Spartanburg County. The  first mills in the Upcountry were built on the waters of the Tyger River between 1816 and 1818 by two groups of new Englanders. Both of these mills burned but were rebuilt. One group ceased operation in 1826, the other group continued to  operate small textile mills for many years.  What was special about the textile mill built, at what was to become Glendale, was the size of the operation. Around 1832, Dr. James Bivings came from Lincolnton, NC to build and start what became known as the Bivingsville Cotton Factory.  Click on the following link for full information about the origin and operation of the textile mill at Glendale.

The Textile Mill

In March of 2004, there was a major fire that destroyed most of  the former Glendale mill.  Mr. Terry Gilmer of Glendale photographed the fire as it was happening. He has been kind enough to make his photographs availble to us to use on this website.  Some of his photographs can be seen on the following link. Glendale Mill Fire. 

The Glendale Mill Fire

The Families of Glendale

Starting with the Iron Works and continuing on with the coming of the Bivings textile mill and on down to recent times, Glendale has been a source of jobs and employment. To many folks over the last 200 years, Glendale was almost like the "Promised Land".  In the early 1900's, it was a place where you could work and make cash money on a regular basis. Your family and children had more security than in a life of farming. Some families that found work already lived nearby. For the most part, they gave up full time farming to work in the new industries. Other families came from all over the Upstate of South Carolina and down from the mountains of North Carolina. They all had a common story - they needed work and they heard that jobs could be found at Bivingsville or later Glendale. They packed up their belongings and moved to the mill alongside Lawson's Fork to start a new life. Almost all of the family, including the children, worked in the mill. For a long time, the work schedule was 12 hours a day and a half day on Saturday.

By our modern standards, this was a hard life. However, our ancestors must have preferred it to the never ending toil and uncertain conditions of farming. Most that came to the mills stayed to raise their families there.

There are many residents or former residents whose families have been associated with Glendale for over a hundred years. Behind each of these families there is a wonderful story of how they came to Glendale, their successes and trials and failures. To read some of these family stories, click on the link below.

Glendale Family Stories

We earnestly solicit you to send us your family's story and how it is connected to the story of Glendale. We welcome memories, photographs, and incidents that can be added to the Glendale story. We are particularly interested in how your family came to be connected to Glendale. Also, we encourage you to share the biography of someone in your family to tell their individual story. Please send to Glendale Family Stories .

Life in the Mill Village

People have lived in the Glendale mill village from about 1835 until the present, a period of  over 170 years. Hundreds, if not thousands, of people have lived, been born, died, or otherwise been involved with the village at Glendale. The village and its institutions and facilities have been very important in the lives of people in the past and continue to be so to this day. Click on the the following page to learn more about life in Glendale and  the many things involved.

The Village

Books and Other Information about Glendale

There are several books and other Internet sites that contain interesting information about Glendale. Click on the following page for a list of these.

Other Information