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Fort Walker, almost
Dear Monthly,
The folks at Port Royal Plantation were pleasantly surprised and pleased to see one of our historic sites used as the backdrop for your October mayoral candidates photoshoot and story. Unfortunately, the site was misidentified as Fort Walker — the photos were actually shot at our nearby Steam Gun historic site.
Fort Walker, located about 300 yards to the south of the Steam Gun, was a hastily built Confederate earthen fort — one of three on Hilton Head — and after the 1861 Battle of Port Royal Sound was renamed Fort Welles by occupying Union forces.
The Steam Gun dates to the Spanish-American War and was completed in 1901. The Hilton Head gun site was one of only four such land-based gun emplacements in the U.S., and while known locally as the Steam Gun, it’s officially the Zalinski Pneumatic Dynamite Gun. The gun itself was sold for scrap in 1904, but its brick and concrete structures remain, as your photos show.
In any event, we always enjoy seeing our Port Royal Plantation photographed or mentioned in your magazine.
Will Dopp
Parks & Historic Sites Committee
‘Conveducation’ at the Mall
Dear Monthly,
I read Marc Frey’s editorial in the October issue and his concerns on the mall, downtown and education. Pictured above is a little sketch for what might be a direction for The Mall at Shelter Cove: The Conveducation Civic Center, a one-stop shop for conventions, educational facilities, dining, town meetings — anything you like.
The blue “open space” is where the roof has been removed. The Mall is, in effect, four separate wings. It is no longer one big empty box, but a re-faced downtown with an open square.
Keep the faith!
Amos Hummell
Bluffton
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