I have been reading the books by Robert Morgan and have thoroughly enjoyed each and everyone. Robert is a nationally known author and is from the part of NC where I grew up. Although classified as fiction he writes stories based on his ancestors who lived in that area. He writes using their dialect, the same one I grew up hearing from my own ancestors. Actually we are related somewhere down the line, distant cousins. In the process of reading his stories I have occasionally run into places he mentions that are located right here where we are currently living. I have passed right by most of these places all my life, never giving them a thought. Now when I see something I have read about in his books my eyes light up and I stop and check it out. One such place is the Poinsett Bridge. It is located only a few miles from our RV park. On my way home from my Mom’s house the other day I decided to find this bridge. I had finished reading Robert’s story about the building of this bridge the day before. I did a little more researching and found out it is the oldest standing bridge in South Carolina. It was built in 1820 so people could travel between Greenville and Asheville going to the market. It also provided a way for the people living in Charleston who wanted to escape the hot, humid summers to travel to the mountains of NC where the air was crisper and cooler. I took the winding little road and there it was! It was a beautiful autumn day and the weather was perfect. I parked, got out and walked all around the bridge to get some pictures. Since I had just finished reading about the building of the bridge it was all fresh on my mind and actually being there I felt a connection with the men who had built it. The bridge is named for Joel R. Poinsett, director of the S.C. Board of Public Works during the design of the road. Pointsett gained greater fame for introducing the poinsettia to the United States. He was the first US Ambassador to Mexico, being appointed by President John Quincy Adams in the 1820's. He was a botanist and during his stay in Mexico he wandered the countryside looking for new plant species. In 1828 he found a beautiful shrub with large red flowers growing next to a road. He took cuttings from the plant and brought them back to his greenhouse in South Carolina. Even though Poinsett had an outstanding career as a United States Congressman and as an ambassador he will always be remembered for introducing the poinsettia into the United States. I never knew any of that before and it is only because of reading Robert Morgan’s books that I became interested enough to seek out the bridge and then do further research into it. The Poinsett Highway here in Greenville is named after Mr. Poinsett as well. Very interesting!
this was the road I took to get to the bridge, I thought it looked pretty with the vines growing right over the road making it appear as a tunnel.
a stone monument with info about the bridge
A view of the bridge from the road that passes by it today. Gap Creek (title of another or Robert Morgan's books) is the creek that flows thru the bridge. It was nearly dried up when I was there but there was still a trickle of water flowing through.
A close up view of the rock work of the bridge, notice the tight fit of each block, using little or no mortar to hold the rocks in place.
a close up view of the gothic arch opening, again notice the tight fitting blocks, this quality construction is what has kept this bridge standing since 1820
