Pendleton Historic Foundation

Information may not be reliable

Woodburn is a graceful four-story clapboard plantation house built c. 1830 with a wrap-around-2-story piazza built as a summer home by Charles Cotseworth Pinckney (1789-1865). The house is an excellent example of an early 19th century SC Upcountry plantation house. While owned by members of the wealthy Adger family of Charleston, the house was expanded to 18 rooms, and the farmland was increased to over 1,000 acres. The historic site now consits of the house museum furnished with antebellum antiques and family artifacts, situated of 10 acres of the original plantation with a walking trail to the ruins of other farm outbuildings. Also on site are three outbuidlings, A reproduction of the Adger Victorian Carriage house contains the traveling coach of Thomas Green Clemson; a one-room c.1810 log house built by Robert Moorhead serves as the cookhouse; and a reproduction of a slave/tenant house interprets the life of Jane Edna Hunter, the African-American activist who founded the Phylis Wheatley Society, who was born in such a house at Woodburn in 1882.
Woodburn is open for tours from April-October on Sundays from 2-5 PM, and is available for outdoor weddings, and receptions. Private tours may be scheduled year around.
Directions to Woodburn: 130 History Lane, Pendleton, SC 29670
From I-85, take exit 19B (US76). Turn onto US76 N towards Clemson and Pendleton. Continue for approximately 9 miles to the traffic light at Woodburn Rd. The campus of Tri-County Technical College will be on the right. Turn left at this intersection, and look for the sign for Woodburn at the corner after turning across US76. The large sign marks the entrance to History Lane. Turn right onto History Lane and continue to the end where the gate of Woodburn is located.

Ashtabula is a charming two-story clapboard plantation house built c. 1825 by Lewis Ladson Gibbes (1771-1828) and his wife, the former Maria Drayton and later owned by their son Lewis Reeves Gibbs, the famous SC naturalist. The house was expanded to 10 rooms by later owners and the farmland expanded to over 1,000 acres. The orginal 2-story brick building on the site dates to before 1790 and was the site of a traveler's tavern prior to the building of the main house. This building was later attached to the main house with a breezway and was used as the plantation kitchen, and other rooms are interpreted as servant's quarters and a school room. Ashtabula is a house museum situated on ten acres of open ground with its colonial period brick dependency and well house. The house was restored by the Pendleton Historic Foundation and furnished with antebellum antiques and family artifacts.
Ashtabula is open for tours from April-October on Tuesdays-Thursdays, and Sundays from 1-4 PM, and is avilable for private tours year-around as well as for small outdoor weddings and receptions.
Directions to Ashtabula: 2725 Old Greenville Hwy, Central, SC 29630
From I-85, take exit 19B (US76). Turn onto US76 N towards Clemson and Pendleton. Continue for approximately 8 miles to the intersection with Bus. SC 28. There will be a traffic light at this intersection and a shopping center. Turn right onto Bus. SC 28 (Mechanic St). and continue on Mechanic St. for apprxoimately one mile to the Pendleton town square. At the traffic light on the town square, turn right onto SC 88 (E. Queen St.) and follow signs for SC 88 (Greenville St.) and Ashtabula. The gate to Ashtabula will be on the left apprxoimately 3 miles from town square.

The Pendleton Historic Foundation wishes to thank Ashley Cowden, and her Business Writing Class at Clemson University for their assistance with the website. Ashley Cowden may be contacted at cowden2@g.clemson.edu

Saturday, November 13, 2010: 19th Century Mourning Traditions and Customs at Ashtabula
Friday and Saturday, December 3-4; 10-11 5:30-8:30 PM, and Sunday December 5, 12, 3-5PM, Christmas Reenactment at Ashtabula Plantation

Pendleton Historic Foundation P.O. Box 444 Pendleton, SC 29670 Phone 864.646.7249 Email info@pendletonhistoricfoundation.org