Slobot About Town XXV:
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Slobot goes to Camp Croft, pt. 1!
It was a beautiful autumn day.
Primo sweater weather.
Slobot was exploring a vast and curious land.
He found a bridge that went nowhere...
and upon which no one treads.
Slobot even found a hearth with no home!
Slobot deployed technology to get to the root of things.
And what Slobot found was scary!
Indeed, Slobot learned that you should never,
ever fight explosive fires... |
when you are in Camp Croft State Park! |
Why? |
Because Camp Croft was once a training camp for
the US Infantry! |
On November 8, 1940 the US government, anticipating
war in the Pacific and Europe, proposed the creation of a new training
camp to be located in Spartanburg County. |
It would be named after Major General Edward Croft
(1874-1938), distinguished WWI officer and South Carolinian. |
The camp, officially activated on January 10,
1941, drew trainees largely from Pennsylvania, New York, New England
and other parts north. |
Those trainees were subjected to 13 weeks of M-1
rifles, Browning Automatic Rifles, anti-tank rockets, infantry mortars,
gas chambers and amphibious warfare. |
The camp would close in 1946. |
Mortar shells, hand grenades, rockets and tons
of scrap were removed by the Army Corps of Engineers in a thorough
project begun in the 1990s and which ran through the 2000s. |
Today some 7,054 acres of the former site are
preserved as a state park. |
Stay tuned for more Slobot adventures in Camp
Croft! |