The South is filled with alleyways like this one from rural Bamberg, S.C. The two-story building at left with vines crawling up the side is the back of the town’s old city hall, now empty and vacant on the main drag, U.S. Highway 301. In the middle, you can see how owners of a furniture store made boarded-up back windows more attractive by portraying various colored Palmetto trees, the state symbol.
As mentioned in an earlier post, just over 30 percent of the 15,987 people in Bamberg County in 2010 lived below the poverty level, according to the U.S. Census. The majority of residents are black (61.5 percent) with whites comprising 36.1 percent. Some 1.6 percent of residents are Latino while 0.4 percent are of Asian descent.
Photo taken May 6, 2013, by Andy Brack, president of the Center for a Better South
- QuickFacts about Bamberg County from the U.S. Census.