Category Archives: Lifestyles
Give the gift of healing this year
The gift of massage treats recipients to relaxation and the healing power of therapy and can serve as an escape from the stresses of daily life.
In their 21st annual consumer survey, the American Massage Therapy Association says 19 percent of consumers reported receiving a massage from a professional therapist in the previous year. Many people rely on massage for medical relief, including to alleviate muscle soreness, stiffness or spasms. Massage can also aid in the recovery from migraines, help prevent injury and assist in general well-being.
Gifting massage is easy when one knows the type of massage a person desires and the place he or she frequently visits for massage therapy. However, those
You must be logged in to view this content.
Subscribe Today or Login
Working together to save the oceans
By Jason Evans
Staff Reporter
LIBERTY —
The public has an opportunity Saturday to see a fun, educational musical with a timely message.
Student audiences have been enjoying “Something Very Fishy” at the Pickens County Performing Arts Center in Liberty for more than a week, but a public performance of the play will be held at 10 a.m. this Saturday.
More than 2,700 area public and homeschool students will see “Something Very Fishy” during its run, which began Jan. 30 at the center, Pickens County tourism director Jay Pitts said.
Kathy Prosser’s musical tells the story of Sandy Carson, a young science major conducting coral transplant research, and Stu Pidder, a fisherman who treats the ocean as his own personal garbage dump.
The audience sees first-hand the effects of littering, not only on the coral reefs but on the lives of Boss the great white shark and his aquatic friends.
“‘Something Very Fishy’ started as an early education program in Australia, which toured around Australia to many thousands of children,” Prosser said. “It was really
You must be logged in to view this content.
Subscribe Today or Login
Clemson plans campus CollabFest to celebrate creativity
By Tara Romanella
Clemson University
news@thepccourier.com
CLEMSON — From Wednesday, Feb. 27, through Saturday, March 2, the CollabFest at Clemson University will celebrate creativity with a slate of art, film, technology and food events that seek to inspire, entertain and educate.
Famed designer Tina Roth Eisenberg will deliver the festival’s keynote at 5 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 28, in the Watt Family Innovation Center. Jason Levine, Adobe’s principal worldwide evangelist, will give a keynote in the Watt Family Innovation Center at 3 p.m. Friday, Feb. 29, during the Adobe Creative Jam.
CollabFest was created by a collective group of departments across
You must be logged in to view this content.
Subscribe Today or Login
Cracking up for a cause
Show to raise money, awareness for needs of those with autism
LIBERTY — Liberty High School’s Walking Shadows improv group will kick off the second half of its regular season on Thursday, Feb. 7,
Broadway actress Kimilee Bryant will join Liberty High School’s Walking Shadows improv troupe for a benefit show Feb. 7.
with “Improv Never Dies,” featuring Broadway actress Kimilee Bryant.
The show will also serve as a benefit to raise money for and awareness of the needs of those on the autism spectrum in the state.
“I’ve been looking for a cause for our group to get involved with, and this seemed like an area where we could make an impact,” LHS improv coach and Accelerate supervisor David Holland said.
The show will start at 7 p.m. in the Liberty High School auditorium.
Before the show, a panel discussion will be held featuring experts in the field who will give insights into the struggles, triumphs and needs of individuals with autism and their families. In addition, space will
You must be logged in to view this content.
Subscribe Today or Login
Learning more about the life of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Well respected, honored and appreciated for his civil rights activism, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. rightfully earned his place as one of the most influential figures in American and world history. Through his 
religious teachings and social activism, Dr. King played a key role in the American Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 1960s.
While Dr. King lived a good portion of his life in the public eye, many facts of his life are not widely known. In honor of his birthday and
You must be logged in to view this content.
Subscribe Today or Login
Celebration of champions
Thousands of fans lined College Avenue in downtown Clemson and the streets of the Clemson University campus on Saturday morning as a parade 
led the 2019 College Football Playoff champion Tigers to Memorial Stadium for a celebration of the team’s second national title in three seasons. The Tigers took down top-ranked Alabama 44-16 in the championship game on Jan. 7 to give Clemson its third national crown in program history. Asked about the atmosphere during the parade by an Upstate TV news station, head coach Dabo Swinney responded, “It’s surreal. Can’t wait to do it again.”
Photos courtesy ClemsonTigers.com
Six Mile cloggers audition for ‘America’s Got Talent’
By Jason Evans
Staff Reporter
jevans@thepccourier.com
SIX MILE — A local clogging team is hoping to show off its talents nationwide.
The team included nine members of the studio’s Footloose team.
HotFoot Studios owner Sharon Finley said Footloose, the studio’s senior team, took part in auditions for “America’s Got Talent” in Charlotte, N.C., on Dec. 15.
“We participated first in Pickens County’s Got Talent,” Finley said.
Pickens County’s Got Talent 
was held as part of the county’s “Blue Ribbon Birthday Bash” sesquicentennial celebration Oct. 6 in Easley.
“We competed in Pickens County’s Got Talent,” Finley said. “We won.”
Because of its success, the team was invited to audition for the 14th season of the popular television show, expected to begin later this year on NBC.
“We got what’s called a front of the line pass,” Finley said. “It was really fun and a great opportunity for us.”
A hostess met the team and guided them around the proceedings, she said.
“We learned a lot about behind the scenes of ‘America’s Got Talent,’” Finley said. “We even performed for the entertainers there. We were made to feel really special. It was a great day for us. We had a great time.”
The team will learn sometime between now and March 1 if they’ll be going
You must be logged in to view this content.
Subscribe Today or Login
The Jocassee Gorges of today
Bountiful fishing and stellar natural resource management
By Dr. Thomas Cloer, Jr.
Special to The Courier
Part one of this article attempted to describe Duke Energy’s Keowee-Toxaway Project that dammed the rivers of the Jocassee Gorges, and 
resulted in lakes Keowee and Jocassee. That massive project was just underway for the 100th birthday of Pickens County in 1968. Part 2 will view things after the project was completed.
Serendipity
I remember vividly what happened on tributaries of Lake Jocassee soon after the lake filled and trout were stocked. Each of the rivers already had big trout. However, the hydroelectric process began to entrain fish, and the cannibalistic nature of huge trout soon began a phenomenon that produced really huge fish. When water from Lake Keowee was pumped backward and upstream into Jocassee, many fish would be entrained and belched out in Jocassee around the water intakes. Monstrous trout would cruise around the intakes waiting for fish morsels.
You must be logged in to view this content.
Subscribe Today or Login
Pickens County at 150
Local professor and outdoorsman
reflects on a century and a half
By Dr. Thomas Cloer, Jr.
Special to The Courier
I can’t believe it! Has it really been 50 years since we celebrated the centennial birthday of Pickens County in 1968? I remember the old tie I wore for a picture. I remember the long beards the men grew, and the long dresses with bonnets that the women wore. The year 1968 really sticks in my memory, because the gigantic Keowee-Toxaway Project had started developing lakes Keowee and Jocassee. I think that I could make a good argument that nothing has affected the physical features of Pickens County more for millions of years, much less for 50 years, than that massive earth-changing project.
Looking Back to the Keowee-Toxaway Project
People first heard of the Keowee-Toxaway Project of Duke Power when it was announced at Clemson University. The announcement was made Jan. 2, 1965, by W.B. McGuire, president of Duke Energy. My fiancée, Elaine Kowalski, and I were in college in Kentucky, and were planning to marry after that sophomore year. It was not until 1966 that we got the word that
Above: Tom and Elaine Cloer pose with baby Tom III at the 1968 Pickens County centennial celebration.
Top left: The building of Duke Energy’s Oconee Nuclear Station, pictured in this early artist rendering, marked a major turning point in the history of Pickens County.
Top right: Tom Cloer and his father, Carl T. Cloer Sr., speak at the Pickens sawmill, which was built “to accommodate the treasures of timber to be removed for the gargantuan Keowee-Toxaway Project,” according to the author.
Top: Tom Cloer fly fishes in the Jocassee Gorges, one of the great natural features of Pickens County that dates back much, much farther than the county’s 150-year history.
the big steam band-saw mill that controlled our lives was to stop producing lumber on the bank of Stinking Creek, Tenn.
A brand-new sawmill was to be constructed in Pickens to accommodate the treasures of timber to be removed for the gargantuan Keowee-Toxaway Project. This would lead eventually to the damming of such national treasures as the Whitewater, Thompson, Toxaway, Horsepasture, Eastatoe and Keowee rivers in the Jocassee Goorges. Bearcamp Creek, Wright’s Creek, Laurel Fork and Mills Creek would all be backed to their highest falls. I fished them all. They had
You must be logged in to view this content.
Subscribe Today or Login
Making spirits bright.
The holiday season begins in late November and runs through New Year’s Day. It is marked by various gatherings of friends and family, decadent foods, cocktails, traveling, and gift exchanges. The National Retail Federation says consumers will spend an average of $967 during the holiday season. However, the joy of the holidays also is about all of the
memorable experiences that tend to make the season so beloved.
With that in mind, here are 30 ways to make the holiday season that much more merry.
1. Visit with an elderly or housebound neighbor and share conversation.
2. Donate gently used toys to a children’s hospital.
3. Research the history of the holiday and share it with people you care about.
4. Make handmade Christmas tree ornaments.
5. Donate money to a charity or other good cause.
6. Encourage “pay it forward” movements in your community. Start by doing something simple like
You must be logged in to view this content.
Subscribe Today or Login
