Local councils take part in state leadership training
COLUMBIA — City council members from the City of Liberty and the City of Pickens spent last week in Columbia More »
Hot-shooting Hillcrest keeps Easley winless in region play
By Bru Nimmons Sports Editor bnimmons@thepccourier.com EASLEY — Holding a 60-57 lead entering the fourth quarter of their matchup against More »
LWVOP receives empowerment grant to expand local voter education efforts
UPSTATE — The League of Women Voters of Oconee and Pickens Counties (LWVOP) is excited to announce that it has More »
PC Native Plant Jubilee returns on May 2
LIBERTY — The Pickens County Native Plant Jubilee will return for its second year Saturday, May 2, bringing together gardeners, More »
Defender asks for more staff in future
By Jason Evans
Staff Reporter
jevans@thepccourier.com
PICKENS — Thirteenth Judicial Circuit public defender Chris Scalzo is asking Pickens County Council to consider helping his office add more staff in future years.
Scalzo gave an update to Pickens County Council during a recent meeting.
Scalzo is requesting $296,564 in funding from Pickens County for the 2020-21 fiscal year.
His request is $8,728 more than Pickens County’s portion of his office’s funding for the current fiscal year.
Scalzo said that increase is primarily to cover a 3 percent increase in employee salaries.
“It’s not a request for any positions,” he said.
The $216,258 in funding Pickens County provided in fiscal year
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Six Mile Issaqueena Festival is Saturday
By Bru Nimmons
Staff Reporter
bnimmons@thepccourier.com
SIX MILE — The annual Issaqueena Festival is happening this Saturday, April 6, on Main Street in Six Mile. The festival, which takes place in concurrence with the Greater Clemson Music Festival, will run from 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m.
The festival includes a whole host of activities including: craft and food vendors, inflatables and games for kids, music and entertainment, and even the blood mobile. In addition to the activities, a pound cake contest will be held at the festival. Pound cakes are to be dropped off at the Roper Building of the Six Mile Baptist Church at 9:30 a.m. From there, judging will begin and a winner will be chosen. All
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Easley Spring Fling is Saturday
By Jason Evans
Staff Reporter
jevans@thepccourier.com
EASLEY — Easley’s Spring Fling will feature more than 130 vendors this Saturday.
The event is scheduled for 9 a.m.-3 p.m. at Old Market Square.
City clerk and farmers marker manager Lisa Chapman said the festival will feature two entertainment stages.
The Easley Combined Utilities stage will host dance performances and acoustic performances.
“There will be jazz bands all day long on the amphitheater stage,” Chapman said.
The Easley Community Band will play from 9-9:30 a.m. They’ll
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Dilworth named Liberty High boys’ basketball coach
LIBERTY — Jonathan Dilworth, who has led the Liberty High School Red Devil girls’ basketball team for the past five seasons, 
has been named boys’ basketball coach for next school year.
Dilworth will also continue in his role as associate athletic director at the school.
“Coach Dilworth has earned the trust and respect of our community, faculty and staff, and most importantly our student-athletes,” Liberty principal Josh Oxendine said. “I have great confidence in his ability to thrive and lead in this new role.”
Dilworth is a product of the School District of Pickens County
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Adult coed volleyball leagues now forming
PICKENS — The Pickens Recreation Department is now holding registration for adult coed volleyball.
Players must be 21 years old or older, and ID is required. The registration fee will be $45 for in-city couples and $55 for out-of-city couples and due at time of sign-up. Individual fees are $22.50 in city and $27.50 out of city.
Due date for registration fees is this Friday at the Pickens Recreation Center on Sangamo Road. Fees are non-refundable.
Once registration is concluded, single players will be placed on
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Might still doesn’t make right
I went to the flea market Wednesday morning to buy some jonquils. I found them, as always in the spring, in all colors and varieties at the table where a couple sells them each year. I came 
home not only with jonquils, but with the memory of a chance encounter that moved me profoundly.
I was walking down the last row not yet explored and saw a large beveled-edge mirror at in a booth manned by a young couple.
The size was right, the glass was first-quality, but the frame was not a winner.
But the price was $10. And the frame could easily be painted.
So I decided to buy it. It was very heavy, and the young man said he’d be glad to carry it to the car for me.
Since I could barely lift it, I accepted his kind offer.
We talked a little bit, and he said his wife told him he is supposed to negotiate on price. I agreed. He should have started
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O’Shields Grocery
The year 1954 was a big one for the O’Shields family. I recall Daddy, my brother, Bobby, and a couple others gathering some tools from the old garage and heading across the field toward 
the west side of the house.
When I asked what they were going to do, Bobby replied “we’re gonna build a store.” Then the excitement began for me. A store. I could not believe it.
All the good things Uncle Grover had in his store would be close by in our own store. I don’t recall it taking that long to build. A few hundred concrete blocks, several shelves, mostly stocked with candy, I envisioned.
And so it was … O’Shields Grocery, a northern Pickens institution. We were on the map. We even had had rabies inoculation clinics there. It was a neighborhood meeting place
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New SC child welfare chief faces big task
Gov. Henry McMaster has made a promising hire to help turn around the S.C. Department of Social Services which, like the Department of Corrections, has been operating in crisis mode for years. So it’s clear that Michael Leach of the Tennessee 
Department of Children’s Services will need plenty of help to bring to South Carolina the kind of reforms that improved his Tennessee agency and, more importantly, the lives of thousands of often abused or neglected children.
There’s much to recommend Mr. Leach. The Tennessee agency suffered from ills remarkably similar to those in South Carolina, but in a hopeful sign, it now stands out as a national model for
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Courier Letters to the Editor 4-3-19
Views not shared by community
Dear Editor,
I’m writing today with a request. Would you please consider setting a limit on the number of times a month that you publish letters from each reader?
I appreciate that you need content and that drama sells papers, but the divisive letters that you publish almost weekly from the same three writers are exhausting. More importantly, they represent a small group of very vocal people who seem to think that their intolerant views are shared by our entire community. They are not.
As shown in election after election, including the most recent
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Courier Obituaries 4-3-19
BETTY COWARD STILLWELL
SIX MILE — Betty Rand Coward Stillwell of Six Mile passed away peacefully on March 30, 2019, surrounded by her family.
She was born in Raleigh, N.C., on Jan. 8, 1934, to William 
Roscoe and Elizabeth Purnell Rand. She was preceded in death by her sister, Billie Frances, her parents, and her first husband, James Kent Coward Sr.
Betty grew up in Garner, N.C., and was a member of Garner United Methodist Church and enjoyed shepherding her three younger sisters. At the age of 16, she won a trip to Hollywood in
