Friends of Congaree Swamp

10/12/2026

With CONG 50 approaching, we wanted to share photos from a 2009 reunion of Congaree Swamp activists organized by Betsy Newman of SCETV. Sadly, several of the people at the event have passed away since then: Brion Blackwelder (2024), John Culler (2024), Ann Jennings (2023), Edmund Taylor (2017), Mary Taylor (2022).

As part of the Roots in the River film project, SCETV producer Betsy Newman organized a reunion of the activitists who preserved Congaree Swamp. We have organized Rhonda Grego's photos from our pre-Facebook era into an album documenting the event.

10/09/2026

Park staff shared the sad news that long-time volunteer Kenny Boggs had passed away at the age of 75. Kenny was also an active member of Friends, participating in field trips and service activities. The first photo (one of our favorite trail-clearing photos ever) shows Kenny with Alice Steinke and Mary Jackson as we prepared to work on trails after the terrible ice storm of February 2014. The next photo shows Kenny at a tip-up near Tear Pond on a trail-clearing in November 2013.

10/09/2026

John Cely (pictured on the left) first experienced the old-growth forest of the Congaree floodplain in 1967 while a student at Clemson University, and was hooked from that moment forward. He recalled seeing a picture of Harry Hampton standing next to a bald cypress tree in an issue of the South Carolina Wildlife Magazine and being so fascinated that he wrote a letter to the journalist, which led to Hampton inviting him to come down and meet him to see the trees for himself, an experience that resulted in him becoming enamored with its beauty and history. While attending graduate school at the University of South Carolina in the 1970s, he would become involved with the campaign to preserve the floodplain landscape, going out with Jim Elder to survey and measure the champion-size trees that were found there. In his book "Woods and Waters and Some Asides," Hampton would write that Cely had "dug up more information on its history than anyone else, so far as I know." To this day, Cely continues to explore, research and learn about the natural and cultural history of the park landscape, mapping out many of its features in detail.



Image Caption: John Cely (on the left) is pictured here inspecting a large stump alongside Congaree Swamp National Preserve Association president Jim Elder (center) and Professor of Zoology at the University of Tennessee James Tanner (right). Tanner had done the most in-depth observations and studies of the ivory-billed woodpecker in the 1930s and was brought in to the advocacy campaign for his expertise on the ecology of bottomland hardwood forests.

Image Credit: NPS Photo/Open Parks Network

10/08/2026

In this commentary, University of South Carolina geography professor John Kupfer writes about Congaree National Park and its 50 years of federal protection.

10/08/2026

Friends of Congaree Swamp provided public comments on the draft supplementary rule to the Waters of the US. This supplementary rule, drafted only one year after the restrictive 2025 rule, would even further restrict Waters of the US that should be protected by the Clean Water Act.

Information about the scheduled outreach activities regarding EPA and Army's review of the NWPR and intention to replace the definition of "waters of the United States"

10/07/2026

A teacher at Dreher High School in Columbia, South Carolina, Jim Elder was described by Harry Hampton as "that nice Yankee Boy from New Jersey" in a 1979 interview. Elder, who along with other local conservationists would found the Congaree Swamp National Preserve Association in 1974, recalled first meeting Hampton in a Sears in the Five Points area of Columbia. Upon expressing his interest in the old-growth forest in the Congaree floodplain, Hampton drew a map of the noteworthy trees for him. Elder would lead the CSNPA and become the public face of the campaign to preserve the Congaree floodplain from 1974-1976, speaking to congressional committees and helping to spearhead the "Congaree Action Now!" rally in 1975 to boost awareness of their mission.



Image Caption: Pictured here getting ready to head out by boat on a tour of the old-growth forest in the floodplain of the Congaree are, from left to right, Dick Watkins, Jim Elder, and Mike McAnelly. Watkins and Elder were leading figures of the Congaree Swamp National Preserve Association in the 1970s campaign to preserve the landscape that is today Congaree National Park.

Image Credit: NPS Photo/Open Parks Network

10/06/2026

10/06/2026

Join us in welcoming Artist-in-Residence Paul Moore! A native of Richland County, Paul grew up near what would become Congaree National Park. As a potter, Paul uses natural landscapes like that of the old-growth forest of the Congaree floodplain, as an inspiration for the artwork on his ceramic work and utilizes local materials from the area around Congaree to create them. One of his pieces was even selected to represent Congaree National Park in the National Park Centennial Exhibition in Atlanta, Georgia in 2016!

Paul will be demonstrating the process of creating his work at the Harry Hampton Visitor Center during the month of October, including, both days of the 50th Anniversary Weekend on October 17-18. If you would like to see him at work, stop on by Mondays, Tuesdays, and Fridays this month to watch him throw pots and learn more about how park landscape influences his art!