Myrtle Beach Railroad Depot saved

By Tim Bullard

Steam’s puffing out of the stack. A dog is scratching fleas as a woman dressed in clothing from a different time period prepares to board. As midnight black soot rains from huge clouds of black smoke, one can almost hear that lonesome engine's roar as leather shoe heels crunch gravel near the old Myrtle Beach depot on an excursion trip to the Atlantic shore.
All aboard for Myrtle Beach’s noble project to save a historic railroad depot.
You may have seen it covered in weeds downtown as the track still runs beside it toward the ocean. Local citizens have banded together to save this structure, and local photographer Jack Thompson is happy that it looks like the goal will be reached.
The Myrtle Beach All Aboard Committee wants to restore the depot located on Ninth Avenue Extension, near Broadway with its 501(c)3 status. The group meets every other Monday at City Hall in its quest.
“We began our fund raising project a year ago,” said Thompson. “Our goal was $650,000, and to date we have right at $425,000. We have applied to the S.C. Department of Archives and History for designation as a historic place to be put on the S.C. Historic Register as well as the National Register of Historic Places. In doing that the S.C. Department of Archives and History wants to look over our architectural blueprints and drawings to see that we will restore the train depot back to its original state and not necessarily do any upgrading or any modernizing.
“There are some modernizations within bounds such as handicapped bathrooms and toilet facilities. In view of that the original plans that we had to upgrade the building and modernize the building are going to take a back seat now. They prefer that we just simply restore it back to the way it was when the ribbon was cut by Simeon Chapin on May 7 in 1937. Our plans now are to cut the ribbon once again on the anniversary of that date this coming May 7. We plan to cut the ribbon and reopen the facility as a community youth center and for numerous civic group meetings on a reservation basis.
“We do plan to landscape the grounds. That property is one and a quarter acres. During the restoration of the building, we also plan to completely landscape the grounds and make a beautiful park to create a beautiful flagship tourist attraction. We plan to put down a time capsule. We plan to put in a beautiful flagpole which is the flagpole what once flew over the officer’s headquarters at Myrtle Beach Air Force Base which was part of the 357th Fighter Wing. We are proud to have that flagpole as a historical piece. We plan to have a ceremony around that flagpole on an annual basis to acknowledge all the men and women who have served the military from this area.
“We plan to have a Walk of History which I expect to be a 20-foot paved walkway all the way around the property that will be inlaid with brick and 12-by-12 pavers that will be engraved with individual names and family names.
“The architectural drawings have been completed. The bids have just been made for a demolition company to come forward and take down the old stucco building that was added to the building. We will be removing that to restore that delivery pickup section back to its original state. The architect is Mr. Dale Gilliland in Greer, Columbia and Myrtle Beach. He has been heavily involved in designing a lot of the medical offices up on 82nd Parkway. He has had experience in restoring at least one old train depot in the Upstate, so we are really happy with his work and progress. We have several people who plan to come on board. Wellbro is planning to help us out with some of the restoration work. We are still looking for a number of other people to come forward to do some work on the roof and windows and doors.
“We have a project to sell bricks and pavers. Mr. Harry Love has painted a lovely watercolor painting, a 16-by-20 watercolor of the train depot as it was originally. We are selling those in return for donations. The print is $250, but we have arrangements with a frame shop to mat and frame that ready to hang for $350. The 4-by-8 bricks with the name engraved is $50, and that is a $50 for all time. The paver 12-by-12 has room for four names. That’s $125 one time for all time. Then that same paver is offered to corporate people who can have their logo engraved. That’s $500 one time. So we are moving along really well. We have about 14 members on the committee. I am chairman.
“I rode by one day. That train depot was hidden from sight for 20 years by a distributing company that had built metal buildings all on that property and had more or less surrounded the little train depot, and it was out of sight, out of mind. When that particular company sold the property, he gave the metal buildings to a salvage company, and they came in, and they moved all the metal and exposed the train depot. It struck me because I had a lot of memories and ties to that depot back in my high school days in the 50s.
“I saw it there, and I went to the city several times to try to coax them into buying the property, and I was turned away by the comment that there was not enough money available to buy the property, and then I learned that the city had at one time wanted to demolish it and put up a parking deck. Then I learned that the city had second thoughts and wanted to pick it up and move it to another location, so I felt like the city at some time was going to buy it and preserve it.
“Then one afternoon I rode by, and two bulldozers had cranked up, spewing black smoke, approaching the train depot, and I jumped the curb in my car and ran out and jumped up on the porch of the train depot, and I said, ‘Wo! You’re not going to tear this building down!’ One of the drivers called the owner in Florence and said there was some crazy person out here trying to stop us. He said, ‘What does he want?’ I said, ‘I want 24 hours.’ And he said, ‘Okay.’ I went before the council that night, and it’s almost like a song, you know. When the time is right for somebody to intervene, I think it’s divine inspiration. I was not on the agenda, but I went to the council, and I walked up front, and I took the mike and said, ‘I’m here at the midnight hour. There is a jewel in our midst, a diamond in the rough. The train depot is about to be destroyed, and I beg you ladies and gentlemen, you cannot let that happen. Surely there is enough wisdom among you to find a way to save that train depot. They listened to what I had to say.
“They went into a short executive session. They came back and said, ‘We found the money if you will be the chairman to raise the funds to restore it.’ I choked a little bit and said, ‘Does that pay anything?’” he said, laughing. “Of course, they laughed and said, ‘No.’ Well I said I’ll accept that challenge, and I will raise the money. They said, ‘We will help you select a committee.’ So I turned in names. They turned in names. The council members turned in names, and shortly after that, the All Aboard Committee was born. We’ve been working diligently, and I’m very proud of all of those members, and we’ve taken it to heart because it is a valuable asset to have for future generations, and we certainly look forward to cutting that ribbon. It was built in 1937. Myrtle Beach Farms Company built that building in 1936 and 1937, and Simeon Chapin cut the ribbon opening the train depot, and on that date, he handed the deed over to the Atlantic Coastline Railroad. We have our schedule set to cut the ribbon and open that facility on the anniversary of May 7, 1937 to May 7, 2002. That’s next May.”
The plan created by the committee was drawn by J. David Utterback, which will include roof work, window repairs, plumbing, renovation to the original existing wooden floors, electrical work, heating and air conditioning and walkways. The plan also calls for a water tower and passenger cover plus railroad cars and an engine.
The group has applied for a TEA-21 Enhancement Grant with the S.C. Department of Transportation and one from the Great American Station Foundation.
The city finally bought the lot of 1.25 acres and the depot for $750,000, and the owner donated $5,000, lowering his original asking price.
“The Myrtle Beach railroad station will be restored and placed on the National Register of Historic Places, and the site developed, supporting its position as a historical focal point, while keeping it available for community access, use and education,” the city’s web site notes.
There is a root word in the word “railroad,” which reminds one of what a railroad really is - a road - two ribbons of steel, bending, stretching out over God’s infrastructure, rained upon by the sweat of some of the hardest-working Americans and foreign workers since the slaves who built the pyramids of Gaza. Spawning legendary mythology like John Henry, railroads have nursed some of this country’s most prolific songwriters, like Woody Guthrie, Mississippi John Hurt, Doc Watson.
According to the Association of American Railroads, trains have been used more and more through this century with the following car loadings listed below:
1940-- 36,358,000
1945-- 41,918,000
1950--38,903,000
1955-- 32,761,707
1960-- 27,886,950
1965-- 28,344,381
1970-- 27,015,020
1975-- 22,929,843
1980-- 22,223,000
1982-- 18,584,760
1983-- 19,013,250
1984-- 20,945,536
1985-- 19,501,242
1986-- 19,588,666
1987-- 20,602,204
1988-- 22,599,993
1989-- 21,226,015
1990-- 21,884,649
1991-- 20,868,297
1992-- 21,205,530
Remember Richard Trevithick? He was English and pioneered steam locomotives in the early 1800s. On June 17,1831 the first person in the United States died in an accident on a railroad when a boiler blew up on America’s very first passenger locomotive, The Best Friend of Charleston. The fireman was killed.
The first train wreck took place near Heightstown, N.J. Nov. 8, 1833 with the Camden & Amboy train derailing from a broken axle, and the first two passenger fatalities were reported with several other injuries. John Quincy Adams, formerly the President, and railroad businessman Cornelius Vanderbilt were also on board.
Brenda O. Moore of Myrtle Beach has been involved in the committee and remembers the local depot with fond memories since her father was an agent there.
“The depot should be left where it is and preserved for future generations,” said Moore after the drive to save the depot started. “With so many historical buildings and locations being displaced or destroyed. This is one of the last remaining links to the past of Myrtle Beach. The railway was instrumental in the beginning of Myrtle Beach as everything from lumber to store supplies arrived here by train. This could be a beautifully restored building, and I would like to see it used, possibly as a museum-visitor’s center.
“The depot could serve as a visitor-welcome center, while giving tourist and locals alike an insight to our past and beginning. This could be accomplished by the help of many sources, one of which is the Myrtle Beach Downtown Redevelopment Corporation.”
The downtown group’s advisory board, appointed from 1995-98, suggested to the Myrtle Beach City Council that it earmark an estimated $2 million for redeveloping, which included the purchase of the depot property.
“My grandfather worked on the railroad for 32 years,” said Buddy Whittington of Myrtle Beach, 38 when the drive began. His grandfather was E.K. “Gene” Whittington.
“He was a brakeman. He lived on 31st Avenue. Everybody knew him as Gene. We went down there and put pennies on the track. My brother got to go and ride the train. When I was a kid, we walked through there and picked up spikes.” The kids would paint the spikes gold, and he had saved some of the spikes.
“I’ve got a log book. He worked for ACL, later the Seaboard. It has routes and times. I think it was in the 30s. He had a retirement watch they gave him. I’ve got old railroad lanterns, the oil ones he used. There’s all kinds of stories I could tell you. My father was telling me the story of them coming from Chadbourn, and a train had hit a car. The train was burning. My grandfather had to pull a kid from it.”
Whittington was pleased to hear that the depot was being saved. “I’m glad. It would be neat to see them do a scale of the track. I think it’s great that they’re keeping it. I figured it would be torn down. There used to be an ice house. It was in the hub.”
“I’m obviously ecstatic about it,” said Derrick Blanton, a railroad enthusiast, when the drive began. He has served on the committee.
“We’ve got little history as it is. I hope it remains on the tracks. It’s a piece of Myrtle Beach history. We lost the Ocean Forest. I think that was one of the saddest days in Myrtle Beach.” Blanton said the railroad was responsible for much of the initial growth. “Everything that came to Myrtle Beach, it came here by train,” he said.
Blanton remembers when Whittington’s grandfather used to tell him stories.
Whittington told him about when rock was transported to build the airport. “It was brought in all by train,“ Blanton said. “It was a wooden structure first. The tracks used to go all the way to the Pavilion by 9th Avenue.”
In December 1887 the first train came to Conway from Chadbourn, according to The Independent Republic of Horry. The first train to Myrtle Beach ran in 1900, according to the publication.
A survey was done between Conway and the coast by F.G. Burroughs and F.A. Burroughs, his son, in 1896, and the railroad’s name was the Conway Coast & Western Railroad, which was bought out by Atlantic Coast Line in 1912. According to the Chapin Library Archives and Myrtle Beach Scrapbooks I-II, lots were sold by Burroughs & Collins around railroad tracks in Aynor in 1910, and the Burroughs Railroad Company built the first tracks to the coast, changing its name from Conway and Seacoast Railroad to Conway, Coast and Western Railroad in July 1904. The Conway Seashore Railroad was chartered in State Act 147 Feb. 28, 1899. Ed Baldwin of Georgetown was the engineer on the Black Maria, a logging engine from Tabor City, N.C. with wide tread wheels which ran from Conway to New Town.
James H. Chadbourn bought CC&W a year later, and a construction crew member was killed by gunfire one evening in the autumn of 1905, so construction stopped.
“The railroad used to come down by where the Pavilion parking lot is now, and there were only two hotels - the Seaside Inn and the Lafayette Manor,” Walter Geathers told Sun News Women’s Editor Jennifer Amor in the April 14, 1975 issue. The Seaside Inn, a three-story wood frame structure with a cupola and boardwalk, opened in June 1901 after Burroughs & Collins Co. had developed New Town, which changed its name to Myrtle Beach Nov. 1, 1900. The boardwalk led to the Atlantic in the front and to the railroad depot about a block away.
“Up until 1912, people had to depend on the railroad to reach Myrtle Beach,” one archival article at Chapin Library reported. “The tram road was taken over by the Atlantic Coastline Railroad and developed into a standard railroad track. Soon after 1912, roads were improved so that the area became more accessible to visitors. Quite a few people from Florence became interested in the beach and bought most of the lots north to the present site of the Ocean Plaza Hotel.”
Chadbourn came to visit W.H. Privett, grandfather of Ruby Sasser Jones, who wrote, “My Father, The Captain.”
“His train would be a museum piece today! The engine was an old wood burner that had to stop about every ten miles and get wood and water. Great stacks of wood were placed by the railroad, and a great water tank stood nearby.
“There were two coaches and a baggage car besides the freight cars. There were no window screens, so it was wise to wear dark clothes. The smoke and soot poured in through the windows. The coal-burning engines increased this necessity. I remember the first coal burner that came to Conway. Crowds of people came to the station to see it. Mr. Henry Baldwin was the engineer on my father's train. He was loved by every member of our family.
“Sometimes the railroad company would run excursions to Myrtle Beach, usually on Sunday or the Fourth of July. Then they would fix up coaches and some box cars with passengers standing up. It was a great disappointment to me that my father would never let me take that trip in one of those box cars. Neither would he ever give in to my great desire to ride to the beach with Mr. Baldwin in the engine!
“The Captain knew every person that rode his train. He made sure of that before they got off. He loved people! He had a great personality, a marvelous sense of humor and never failed to play a trick on somebody, if it were at all possible.
“His train was put to so many uses! For instance, it was a ‘potato train’ during the potato season. Late in the afternoon, he, Mr. Baldwin, and the crew went to Burcol about four miles from Myrtle Beach and picked up the day's harvest of potatoes grown by Myrtle Beach Farms Company. Next morning at 5 a.m. these were transferred to a train going to Chadbourn and on their way to northern markets. Sometimes it was a special train to haul logs!”
A 1965 Strand Historical Progress Edition in the archives reports on the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad Company and its winter service for Myrtle Beach “that are being received in anticipation of the opening of the new Ocean Forest Hotel and for the convenience of the large number of golfers and visitors expected at the new country club.”
According to this issue of The Myrtle Leaf in January 1930, a weekend Pullman from New York was in operation, leaving New York every Saturday morning at 2:10 and arriving in Myrtle Beach about 7:30 Sunday morning. The Atlantic Coast Line Railroad took over the tram road and turned it into a standard train track with George C. Cox as the first railroad agent.
“In his office was an Oliver typewriter, the first typewriter in Myrtle Beach,” according to one article from The Myrtle Beach Sun dated Sept. 12, 1952.
As you rocked back and forth on your first train ride as a child, the sleepy effect forced your eyelids shut as your ears concentrated on the two distinct thumps as the heavy shiny wheels clacked at the end of each rail. And, if you're lucky, by the time you reach the end of the line, hopefully there will be a Myrtle Beach depot where shadows of past passengers await to greet you at your final destination.