Boone Hall
Boone Hall Plantation is a historic district located in Mount Pleasant, Charleston County, South Carolina, United States and listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The plantation is one of America's oldest plantations still in operation. It has continually produced agricultural crops for over 320 years and is open for public tours. The historic district includes a 1936 Colonial Revival-style dwelling, and multiple significant landscape features, including an allée of southern live oak trees, believed to have been planted in 1743. History 17th and 18th centuries The earliest known reference to the site is in 1681 in a land grant of from owner Theophilus Patey to his daughter Elizabeth and her new husband Major John Boone as a wedding gift. Their land became known as Boone Hall Plantation, but it is unknown when a house was built on the site. John Boone was one of the first settlers to arrive in the colony of South Carolina, doing so in 1672. Boone and his wife were ancestors of Founding Fathers Edward Rutledge and John Rutledge. Boone was elected to the colonial Grand Council during the 1680s, but was removed twice because he illegally trafficked enslaved Native Americans, became associated with pirates, and concealed stolen goods. He did hold other local offices, such as tax assessor and highway commissioner. When Boone died, he divided his estate among his wife and five children. His eldest son, Thomas, made Boone Hall his home. It later passed to another descendant known as John Boone. 19th century The Boone family owned the plantation until fourteen years after descendant John Boone's death, when his widow Sarah Gibbes Boone sold the property in 1811 to Thomas A. Vardell for $12,000 (~$ in ). Shortly after, Henry and John Horlbeck bought the property, including slaves. They used a number of the enslaved workers, formerly in the fields, to make bricks. During the early 19th century, Charleston's landowners built and expanded their houses in town and along the Ashley River. While the Horlbeck brothers have received credit for "building" many houses and public spaces in downtown Charleston using the brick from their plantations, enslaved workers had made the bricks and others accomplished the actual construction under the watch of the Horlbecks and their overseers. The work of talented slaves, with self-taught and acquired skills, including carpentry, mathematics, and geometry, were central to the construction and appearance of many Charleston-area structures. By 1850, these laborers produced 4 million bricks, by hand, per year. The fingerprints of these workers are still visible in the bricks of many of these historic sites. The Horlbeck family planted the allée, the Avenue of Oaks that leads up to the plantation house. Enslaved gardeners and field laborers planted each oak in 1843, using hand tools. Similarly, the Horlbecks directed their workers to plant pecan trees on the plantation to cultivate a commodity crop. By the end of the century, Boone Hall was one of the leading producers of pecans in the United States. When Henry