Like many Southern states, South Carolina is a vivid mosaic of urban centers and pastoral landscapes, a unique blend of New South advances and agrarian traditions. It is within the Palmetto State’s countrysides that many of its leaders in education, industry, and politics emerged, marked by an enduring pride of home and its importance and relevance in the shaping of the state’s history and future.York County is representative of the Carolina experience and its dual identity, with its big city opportunities along its eastern boundaries and its rustic, austere charm lingering in its western sections. This volume explores the county’s bucolic setting from the centrally located county seat of York to its western border along the Broad River and traces the history of the county from an era dominated by early American Indian tribes, to the arrival of the first Scotch-Irish settlers, across three centuries of struggle and progress, to the present. York and Western York County: The Story of a Southern Eden brings to life, through word and image, the personalities and events that shaped York and its western rural paradise, including the small towns of Sharon, Hickory Grove, Smyrna, McConnells, and Bullock’s Creek.