Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of Selling Greenville your favorite real estate podcast here in Greenville South Carolina I'm your host as always Stan McCune Realtor right here in Greenville South Carolina and you can find all of my contact information in the show notes need to reach out to me for any of your real estate needs and just a reminder as always if you like this content please like it physically on the app that you're using subscribe make sure you don't miss future content if you can leave a rating or a review all of those things would be phenomenal as well and I just thank you guys for listening or watching today we have a very special guest this is John Nolan the owner of Greenville History Tours and the president of the Greenville County Historical Society John has I so I've recently went to a presentation that that John gave to a small group of us that included the mayor of Greenville phenomenal presentation I immediately went to him afterwards to say hey would you be willing to come on the podcast and after a few weeks of figuring out the exact timing today was the day that worked so John thank you so much for coming on you're welcome great to be here so John I just want to just start right away because probably half my audience will probably have some sense of who you are maybe half won't but tell us a little bit about what you do you know in those capacities as the owner of Greenville History Tours as the as the president of the Historical Society yes so sorry oh my goodness okay I'm gonna pull up your website while for those that are watching on YouTube they can they can see your website here yeah so twenty years ago I started this tour business and I have always loved history I was an art major studio art major but I took a lot of history classes and looks like John got frozen out there for a second was elected you know you could really start to sense things were changing and so I kind of recognized that there were no tours in Greenville and there were a lot of visitors coming and I had had some tour experience before in a museum and really enjoyed engaging people with cool historical stuff and so kind of saw the need and started reading everything I could about the city it's history and there was a ton there and so I started thinking okay what how can I do this and so I came up with some routes for some walking tours and figured out what I would say what I would point out found a lot of great historic pictures of places on the route that could I could show people you know how things have evolved and changed so I started up 20 years ago with just a couple of walking tours and then couple years in I started doing driving tours people started asking you know can I have a driving tour so I started to do those and then about four years in I I took a food tour up in New York City and had never heard of food tours before that and took one and it was awesome had an awesome time and Learned a lot of history of the area but tried great restaurants great food and so I came back to Greenville and like okay I need to add food tours to my business absolutely then so that was 15 years ago that that started up so you know as Greenville has grown I have really recognized that you know I need to grow with Greenville too so over the years I've expanded my offerings and I'm always thinking you know kind of what's next and so currently I have eight different historic tours of the city four that are walking four that are driving and I have six different food tours different themes so it's been pretty amazing seeing how this business has evolved yeah getting the support of the mayor of Visit Greenville of so many people that has helped along the way and I estimate about 100,000 people now that I've given tours and given lectures to over those 20 years that's incredible it's been quite a journey yeah yeah absolutely that's amazing so how many you know in in just kind of a standard week how many tours are you typically giving yeah let's say 10 to 12 on average okay wow history and food tours that's amazing and I'm trying to I'm actually having issues zoom is giving me issues it actually cut out a second ago that was in case people are wondering that was that was on my end that was on your end I got some kind of a I had some kind of a internet disruption but we got we got the main gist of what you're saying I just wanted to make sure people knew what was happening there so in terms of when people are taking your tours what are but maybe let me ask it this way is there like a certain thing that you know is always going to surprise them or delight them just something that's like okay you kind of got in your back pocket you know this is gonna have some kind of a response you know that the average person simply doesn't know this this fact or whatever that they're gonna be interested in I'm just curious that's a great question I I've got so many facts that I get haha but I you know I over time I've tried to distill it down to a lot of zingers you know right so well you want you want me to tell you the one that that that you said that I heard that I retained that was that was the most surprising to me was and you'll probably tweak exactly what it was but basically that the oldest existing structure in downtown Greenville is that fountain right across from Nose Dive yeah did I get that right it is it's the yeah it's the oldest thing downtown what's it what's it called again it's a it's a I mean it was a fountain for people to refresh themselves along the old road coming from Charleston to Asheville and spring water was fed into it piped into it from nearby and it was along that dirt road that Joel Poinsett you know laid out back in 1820 trying to see if there's an image of it online what would I search for to actually pull up an image of it points at spring I think is what it would come up spring Greenville now there when I pass by it yeah I'm not able to find a picture oh wait actually I did find a picture of it hold on let me let me share my screen for those that are watching online there we go points at spring historical marker that's doesn't look like where is where it is currently but that is the correct spring is it not it is and it's interesting because it is now on its third location the photo you're seeing there is when it was in front of Sobies okay interesting so there's water in it where is that water currently coming from so they bring a pipe up from you know one of the buildings they just kind of brought it out okay yeah interesting so in terms of like Greenville as a whole right obviously Greenville has an interesting history from just a lot of different angles but I feel like Greenville the upstate if we want to call it more broadly has kind of reinvented itself yeah multiple times in in ways that I feel like is kind of odd for a city of our size and in and in a region of our size so I'm curious what are a few if you can just kind of give us you know the audience a sense of some of the formative events that kind of put Greenville on the map made it what it is today yeah so I think there's three kind of identities for our city over time back in its earliest days we evolved into being a resort town for people from Charleston we didn't have which is gonna be funny to some people hearing this and I don't know if you're aware of this but there's a lot of ongoing if any if ever anyone like online like on like a big site like Twitter or somewhere like that post something about Greenville being like one of the best you know cities to go to in South Carolina people from Charleston are always chirping that that they're better so it's ironic to me that people from Charleston were going to Greenville for a vacation yeah because it was it's so hot I mean it still is today and you know they don't necessarily think of going to Greenville now because of air conditioning but people were so desperate to get out of that humidity and heat so if you had money you would get out of there you know at the beginning of summer stay away all summer and then come back so up here in the foothills Greenville going up further into Ashville Hendersonville Brevard you know we were all places that these Charlestonians would frequent in the summer so that's what we began as and beyond that we were agricultural so you know what were people doing in green if I can interrupt for one second these people coming here from Charleston what were they doing were they just not being hot was that or were there like actual things to do ha ha yeah I think it was pretty much a vacation for people I mean they had enough money where they didn't have to you know start some other business here to get in I mean I'm sure that they were corresponding with some businesses they had but I mean even to send mail I mean it would take a week for a letter to get from here back to Charleston right for them to talk with people about what was going on this summer so yeah I think they kind of just hung out and enjoyed their families and the time together yeah alright so continue on I didn't mean to sidetrack either but I was just curious so yeah we did have crops here and of course the low country cotton and indigo and rice were the big crops up here it was more wheat and corn and tobacco so we actually we're a pretty big tobacco growing region before North Carolina took it over you know so up until the 1870s or so we were a lot of tobacco and corn and you know some of these people that would come up from Charleston would you know take care of farms too you know up here yep and so then from there what were kind of like the next kind of two or three whatever yes whatever big moments that kind of got us here yeah right so the civil war game changer for everybody and that was in the wake of the Civil War was the changeover from being agricultural no industry to textiles so the industry was all in New England up until this point all the Mills were up there we were growing all the cotton down here but it was all being sent up to New England to the Mills and so after the war that industry started to shift down here and there's a number of reasons for that one transportation costs you know why send cotton up north when you could build Mills down here northern investors started building Mills down here sure and after the war there was a lot of cheap labor down here so that was another reason and Boston being the center of the textile industry it had a fire in the 1870s and a lot of the cotton merchants and owners businesses burned down and they came down here to kind of start over interesting so that was the big shift after the Civil War to start to have textile Mills which got bigger and bigger you know over a few decades and that's when the shift from tobacco really started to go over to cotton you know we'd hit through some cotton here but you know if there's gonna be Mills all here in the region you know having it close by was just made sense so by the 80s 90s Greenville Anderson Spartanburg we became some of the leading counties for growing cotton in the state so that was that was a shift so that was the second iteration of Greenville was to textiles and that's what put us on the world map you know as a resort town we were regionally known as textiles by 1910 to 20 we were being called the textile center of the south so that was more nationally recognized and then by the 1960s to 70s we were the textile center of the world so that's when the spotlight really got us onto a bigger stage and for those that are not from Greenville that are listening to this like that the imprint of that era is everywhere you go in Greenville you know the old Mills that are still standing obviously Falls Park which will yeah I'm sure talk about later a little bit more in this conversation but I mean you can't escape the textile like you can you can be unaware of our tobacco history and whatnot but it's very hard to escape the history that we have in the textile industry right so yeah that was the second iteration and then of course when textiles started to leave Greenville and the south in in its entirety that's when we had to reinvent ourselves again and that's when we diversified more it's definitely more automotive focused with Michelin and BMW but we have a lot of Asian countries here European investment GE you know doing gas turbine plants fashion law I mean we so for so long we were pretty much just textiles and now we have a wider base of a product how did that happen I mean I've heard the mayor talk about recruiting you know these businesses and what not to the city and I and I guess the county has has done some of that as well but from your perspective what exactly happened to bring some of those larger corporations to the upstate it was a real concerted effort between the governors at the time and senators and mayors here so like Carol Campbell Strom Thurmond you know they were involved in trying to recruit these companies here and so Mayor Max Heller of course being mayor in the early part of our change over to where we are now he was hugely instrumental I think with Michelin especially even after he was mayor I think he you know had a hand still in politics with some things with BMW but yeah it was a real effort between the different entities in our state it wasn't just our mayors although they were very big in that wait when you say governors and senators were they were they just trying to bring it to South Carolina and then it just kind of naturally these companies assessed all of the the South Carolinian cities and sent and decided to go to Greenville and maybe if you went to Columbia if you went to Charleston if you went some other areas or was it specifically an effort for Greenville I think in the 70s and 80s there the concentration really was Greenville you know you can't I can't really think of big companies that were locating you know in those other regions at the time and you know part of that was you know we're on this great corridor of I eighty five between Charlotte and Atlanta we're right on the pipeline to ship a lot of things efficiently you know throughout the southeast and other parts of the country and then of course bringing in the inland port you know going directly right to Charleston that was a great move so I think location had to do with the two and tax breaks and just some leaders that really pushed to get us in the forefront I think yeah absolutely so we're here now obviously you know the you know I mentioned Falls Park before right that's when people think about at least downtown Greenville that's oftentimes what they think about I've talked a little bit about the history of Falls Park but I'd be curious you know for you to kind of share you know just you don't need you can go through the history of it or you can tell us some something you know it may be interesting that that the average person wouldn't know about that history I'm just anything like that I one of the little geeky things for me is seeing old maps and descriptions of dams that have been along the river over the years because scams dams oh dams okay sorry about that yeah so you know they were using that water for powering different industries along there and so they would have to channel the water over there try to control it as much as they can so you know up river on the River Walk kind of by the White's Pavilion over there and a little further down by River Street there used to be dams up that way and then on the Upper Falls you know where everybody all the families take their kids out they all you know walk around on the beautiful area on the Upper Falls there that there used to be dams across there and so actually there's remnants of those dams too so I was just a few weeks ago I knew that there was a water race coming from the river to channel water over to the Camperdown mill which is you know kind of where the Grand Bohemian is you know over that way and so if you walk down to the banks of the river there and you look at some of those rocks you'll see some steel bars that are coming out of the rocks and are trimmed off but you can still see the metal bars there and those are remnants from you know that old race from the mill so that's awesome that's interesting I've got I've got I've just got a picture of the of just the falls for people to see and that area of white people that you were just mentioning is all the way back there yep through the so the area I'm talking about now with those bars is in this photo would be in the upper right along the banks over there yep and then that same side over there to the right there's a you know the railing where people look over to the falls and underneath that railing is a kind of a stone wall and that wall is a foundation wall from the Camperdown mill hmm so that's a that's an old piece and then that drain that's coming out there you know that's kind of a carryover from the old days too oh okay interesting yeah there's just a few little remnants but if you look hard enough and in fact over closer to the Liberty Bridge on that where it comes in to the land over there by Grand Bohemian there is a little bit of a brick structure that's left from the mill as well it's kind of hidden by vegetation now but if you know what you're looking for you'll see it somewhere in this area this is an old this is an old photo here that's right but you're saying this area over here is there not one that has the Grand Bohemian in it let me just look real quick scrolling through random photos on here hmm no I'm probably not gonna find it but where in relation to that hotel so it would be kind of underneath where the Liberty Bridge comes in over on that side okay got it down on that kind of a precipice area yeah interesting yeah I'm just it's crazy how there's so many of these we apparently we need more drone photos that are recent of Falls Park cause these are these are all old so right you know one thing that's interesting is how young Falls Park is as a park it was it well actually that's a good question to ask when did it become called Falls Park is that a is that a recent name or is that was it called that for a long time right that's a so it opened in 2004 and that's when the signage and everything was really you know put in stone literally and you know all that that's a good question if it was referred to much before that it wasn't really a park right so it wouldn't have been called Falls Park that would be my Assumption as well yeah so but the Riverwalk that was earlier so after they did the Peace Center in 1990 they started to make that area nicer with some trails and that bridge again near the Wise Pavilion that little correct section okay exactly so and it they landscaped it kind of over to the Upper Falls even though the Camperdown Bridge was still going over the falls they made it a nicer connection landscape wise between where the white Pavilion is and the Upper Falls so that you know Micro River Walk was really in place from the early 90s until they really finished Falls Park in 2004 so where this sidewalk here ends by the Wise Pavilion mm hmm it's kind of like along this area that you're talking about continuing that way so yeah if you look at old pictures from the 90s and the early 2 before Falls Park that was already kind of nice over there you know not expensive but it was clearly before Falls Park yeah absolutely that's interesting so one thing is fascinating to me is just how people considered that area the area around the falls like prior to it becoming a park right because it was it was basically my understanding is that it was not a place that you would go alone at night never yeah to the person and I've been here 34 years and I have talked to so many people who just say that same mantra over and over you didn't go over the bridge in fact a lot of people say you didn't go past the Poinsettia Hotel okay interesting you know that was the turnaround Court Street like when people were still cruising people were still cruising in the 80s and into the 90s and they would turn around there at Court Street and go back up main and yeah there it was too much crime and unsafe across the river and I even I talked literally talked to somebody who worked at The Greenville News which is right where the Camden Down Plaza is and the AC Hotel and he worked there for years and wasn't even aware that we had a waterfall that's wild he was he was that close and never realized we had a waterfall so I'm gonna tell you something sorry you can finish your thought I was gonna tell you something funny no it's just it's just astounding yeah that's that is astounding hahaha it's like 100 yards away from it yeah hahaha so I went to Bob Jones from 2000 to 2008 two sorry 2004 to 2008 and that was how I actually ended up in Greenville and Bob Jones at that time I don't know a ton about what the rules are like now but it was pretty strict back then and so there was not a whole lot of opportunities to go off campus and in 2006 or 2007 I think it was 2006 someone from my high school that was younger than me went to Bob Jones and I was still friends with him and his family came you know to drop him off as a freshman and asked if I wanted to go out with them you know before the semester started to get something to eat and we went downtown and I had been basically living in Greenville for two years and I'd never been downtown before and I was I was like this is really nice yeah yeah like everything all that I knew was that was the yellow brick of Bob Jones I did not know anything about like I literally did not know that there was a downtown Greenville or that it was like worth going to yes and so that was that was kind of amazing I saw the waterfall for the first time I was like this is sweet this is like I need to go here every now and then yeah but I didn't I didn't go back again until I graduated funny enough so but it's crazy how things like that can be right you know right there but sometimes I feel like as locals we can ignore the things that are in our own city so my wife and I we often times do a staycation once a year so we've stayed at Hotel Domestique that we had a great phenomenal time at Hotel Domestique the time that we stayed there what a what a great experience and are they under new management or something I heard some rumor about something without ownership right right OK yeah OK I heard something I wasn't I wasn't sure if it was accurate or not but I I'm curious in that vein what is what are what are some things that locals tend to not know about in this area that are like listen you need to know this like to enjoy your city hmm well I think that people should try to understand our text about past because there are Mills and they're obvious and people live in them now but and we everybody knows they've heard the phrase textile center of the world but I think to really understand what that was like for Gringo what Mill Life was like what kind of products they made I think that that's that kind of thing only increases people's love and appreciation for our city what's the best way for them to do that to learn more to take my tour OK yeah I have a textile Mills and villages tour and OK I go to seven of the Mills and their villages and we go all around in my tour van I have literally hundreds of photos that I show them on a TV screen of what life was like what it looked like 100 years ago you know what products they made what village life was like it was it's yeah it's pretty immersive so I think that that's the kind of thing that you know I like to say Greenville is so easy to fall in love with I mean you can walk down Main Street you know a visitor for the first time and they will feel the vibe you know and they'll look around and they're like this place is awesome and even people that live here who enjoy it like to go downtown eat and go to the parks when you can start to understand more about how we got here and the foundations and the building blocks your love and your appreciation grows that much more absolutely yeah I love that so I I really that's part of really my passion and my joy is to share that with people I remember there being something about one of the Mills was like the largest in the area what what was that little factory that you shared that I heard yeah so the Woodside Mill from 1913 probably for the next 30 to 40 years they were labeled as the largest mill under one roof in America so it's 69 window bays long I've counted it haha it's a five stories on one side four on the other and you know it's just so massive you go over there and it's overwhelming how huge it is yeah for sure and so yeah that's you know again when you when you start to bring into the conversation things like in the world or in America biggest or best or whatever you know that's significant absolutely yeah and Greenville punches above its weight I feel like in terms of in terms of some of those things yeah what do you so I to my shame I have I've still not been to the Shoeless Joe Jackson museum is that is that a it's a museum right yes OK is that something that you hear people when they when they come to town that they talk about or is that kind of an under the radar thing well it's just something that a lot of people want to experience and go to but unfortunately I hear a lot of frustration because it's only open one day a week and hours are pretty limited sure so you know some people will only be here for a couple days and they're not here just in that window of time to see it so that's unfortunate but I mean I I've talked to the guy who heads it and they're really trying to address that and to change that especially with the fact that Schultz Joe will be in the hall of Fame pretty soon I mean you know it's just a matter of time now that he's gonna be elected in sure and when that happens his profile notoriety is going to skyrocket and we kind of need to be ready for that wave of new interest yeah in him when that happens yeah absolutely but it's a great place and it's the actual house that he lived in and here's a little factoid that's pretty cool next time you go past it or go in the address on the front door so the house is on Field Street and the address is 3:56 and they obviously chose that because that is his lifetime batting average oh how about that and it's his address as well that that's fascinating before they tracked Ops and it was just batting average back then so I wanna talk about you know you were talking about the Mills and what not so obviously you know as a realtor I've sold a lot of mill homes you know the little Mill Village style homes I mean tons of them in in Denin in Judson in Poe Mill in even out in Greer and down towards Connorsy like they're everywhere so and I had told you before the show I might ask a question like this but I'm curious are there any little pockets of Greenville that have kind of interesting before and after stories hmm yeah I mean my specialty is the downtown area and there's some neighborhoods that have been more stable over the years and others that have evolved quite a bit an example would be Altavista you know that has remained stable mm hmm it's a it's one of the most desirable neighborhoods in the city and there's they never really had a down time where it went downhill and you know the rich people moved out or whatever whereas Hampton Pinckney you know it has it's the oldest neighborhood in Greenville and it has lots of 18 homes over there but in the 1960s 70s 80s it was pretty rough and boarded up houses or boarding houses and homeless people and huh so that was a prestigious neighborhood then not and then now it is again interesting and so that's evolved quite a bit is there a reason for like that it that it went through kind of that that downturn kind of period was that just something where the city was just you know not policing the area as much or what was going on there I'm pretty sure it's because of its proximity to downtown because that time period 60s 70s and 80s is exactly the period when our downtown took a nose dive and you know was abandoned and all the department stores went up to the malls and yeah you know all of that interesting what about I'm curious about Poe Mill I used to I used to own some property out there so I don't know where it is currently but I know that at some point it was supposed to be redeveloped I know the mill sold a few times in recent years I'm not sure where things stand maybe you know maybe you don't but what what's OK what do you know about that cause I'm cause I'm curious yes so you know you have two of the closest mill villages in Greenville right there you have Powell and you have American Spinning right across the tracks two huge Mills and villages so an investor bought American Spinning and took a while to really rehab that building and finally got it open a couple years ago or maybe less but it was never fully redone and all the amenities that were kind of promised to the tenants didn't really develop they had planned a food hall there and yeah I remember hearing about that yeah so over the last year I've heard some you know really bad reviews of people who live there and just kind of an unsafe nature of it and just the amenities never really came along and that same owner who developed American Spinning also owned the property at Po Mill okay so all of that land which needed to be addressed where the mill used to be there was some sort of requirement where they had to put in I think it was six feet of dirt new land new soil over the whole property so over the last year or more I saw bulldozers doing that very thing a bunch of dump trucks bringing in dirt and they did it and there were renderings put out for the new apartments that were gonna go up there at pommel and they were gonna keep the two smokestacks and the new apartment buildings were gonna be brick and have kind of the curved windows up top like the old mill windows and it actually it looked great I thought but that was never realized hmm and so I think that the compounding thing of the requirements of the land at Poe and then some of the hurdles they were facing at American Spinning they went into foreclosure just a month or two ago so the tenants got a quick notice like their water's being shut off oh my gosh and it was a mess that's awful so it's kind of it's in transition right now I mean I don't know if how many people have moved out but you're looking for a new owner and this is if I'm not mistaken I believe it's already it I believe the county had it and then they sold it to someone and then I believe that that person sold it to the current owner being foreclosed on I believe if I'm not mistaken I could be wrong about some of that but now it's gonna be changing hands again yeah presumably so that's that that's interesting well hopefully it'll change hands to someone that actually will develop we'll give that area what it deserves you you're absolutely right and we have so many success stories of right Mills that have developed and this blueprint is already there yeah so this is the only one who really has failed so I don't know if one of those other successful ones might take it over and you know apply the things that they've done or what but it's the closest of all the mill sites right I mean that is ha right almost a couple stones from Main Street so right it's the potential is unbelievably huge right there yeah absolutely alright just a few more questions John then I'll let you go cause I know that you're a busy man and I'm sure that you're constantly probably having to research for this job I that would not be the part of the job that I would enjoy but someone's got to do it oh man that's the part I love the most that's what I figured that's what I figured I saw that on your website that old photo you know of you from however many years ago with books out and what not it's just like yeah I can I can see you I can see the vision there so what generally speaking what's the feedback that you get from people when they go on tours with you just about Greenville good bad ugly so generally it's wow you know whether it's newcomers visitors or whether it's people who've been here but don't get downtown very much I really keep up not only on the history but you know what's happening now what are all the projects going on around town so it's kind of overwhelming when I take people through they see so much and they learn so much about how the city is evolved and what's going on now what product projects are going on so it's generally pretty astounding to people and you know I often hear you know people in the back rows saying I wanna move here you know you know this guy and that you get that all the time but you know then you have you know some others who really resent the growth and the development and you know they but that I would say that's the exception on the tours I mean I hear that more online a lot of complaints right but on the tours it's generally positive and one of the one of the things that I have always appreciated the most is I'm not from here I moved here 34 years ago and you know not being a native and being a local historian you know that can rub some people the wrong way sometimes sure but when I can take a native on a tour and at the end they're like I Learned so much this was awesome I loved it that is that's the best compliment to me yeah that's awesome and that's what I really strive for to know the stuff but you know I know that I'll never know the kind of thing that people who lived here know you know and experienced so I'm always trying to learn from those people who really experienced it and what their perspectives are what their experiences are absolutely yeah and I'm sure you know people that like actually you know were here 50 or 60 years ago and got to experience multiple different mayors and all of that that would be a completely different experience and I wish I had that I was I was in New Jersey through high school I would rather have been in Greenville haha yeah no no slide at New Jersey I do still like it up there it's just it's a good it's a good place to visit I would not say it's a particularly great place to live but that's neither here nor there so you do your food tours I know a lot of your food tours are based on the table 3:01 restaurants actually only one of them only one of them OK just one of them well I'm a big table 3:01 fan you know for those that aren't familiar you know that's what Sobe's nose dive what's the Mediterranean a lazy goat they've got the camp they it isn't don't they have something in Malden now at Bridgeway or yeah Tavola so I've not been to that one I've been to all the other ones they're all phenomenal but what are what are some from your perspective just some very obvious places that people need to eat at if they haven't yet or maybe not so obvious yeah so you know doing food tours I feel it's my job and responsibility to know about all the restaurants so of course a couple years ago I made a list of every single place downtown that makes freshly prepared food or drink and so block by block I have a running list and so if something closes something opens I update my list and I've made a concerted effort to go to every single one of them and finally about two months ago I made it to the last place that I needed to visit to have been to every restaurant downtown wow and since then three have opened right and I've been to one but two of them I still haven't been to so you know it's always a thing that I'm always gonna be trying to catch up on for sure but I really you know having getting able to know the managers the owners the servers so well over the years it's wonderful and it's be it's always nice to be able to recommend things to people so that being said I would say my top 5 would be camp scoundrel Coral Gianna and probably Demarco's okay but I just went to Black Sheep a few weeks ago for the first time and it was fantastic and their menu looks I've never been there before really good really creative and it's like I wanna go back and work my way through the whole menu so and you know Cork and Cleaver just opened South Main Social just opened I went there and had a frito misto the other day and it's a take on umm tempura vegetable and shrimp tempura but it was prepared unlike I'd ever had and it was really good and I love being surprised by food you know yeah for sure I think you always kind of have had it but when you have something and you're like oh I've never had this or I've never tried it just like this I love that that's great well I it was a really a shame I'm drawing a blank on the name but the restaurant that closed on Markley Street oh Urban Ren Urban Ren I that one that one hit me hard that was my favorite restaurant in in downtown mine too it was my favorite unbelievable yeah that's where Cork and Cleaver is now okay yeah so I've not yet been there I think my current favorite in Greenville in general is the Patterson not downtown obviously oh yes but I very good I love the Patterson just the entire vibe and the experience and they just got a new chef in recently oh did they okay that's interesting I'll have to I'll have to go back there I think my current favorite downtown it's probably camp probably yep but I've not there are several I'm not quite as well traveled in the food scene as you are so there's several that I've not that I've not yet had a chance to experience so I've got to I've got a up my game here there yeah and my internet connection went out for a second there so you I might have did I freeze for you did but you're fine now okay hopefully the audio didn't freeze but anyway but what I was I was saying I haven't been to as many restaurants as you have downtown there's still there's still several that I need to try and I'm hoping to I too have a list now it's not quite as exhaustive as your list my list is more of like I'll send you mine OK send me yours I would I would definitely like to see that do you do you have like a rating system have you have you gone through and been like I don't I just kind of keep it in my head I take pictures of everything of course and I file everything so I have and that's another thing you know with what I do my involvement both in the culinary world and just Greenville history I try to document the city as best I can over the last 10 to 12 years I've really made a concerted effort to take photos of everything and not just the pretty stuff you know things that are fields or you know yeah ugly and you know knowing that one day those are gonna change quite a bit for sure so I have photographed everything for years and years and it's always great to look back and compare but yeah the food if I like something I'll post about it I'll say you know what I enjoyed if I didn't like it I won't post understood what what's the besides Urban Ramen what's the what's another restaurant that comes to mind that's no that's no longer here that you that you wish that you regret that it closed oh I hear people talk a lot about Devoro's I never got to make it there Devoreaux was special they used to be on my tour when they were here my food tour I think American Grocery is one that's really by a lot of people yeah they were maybe a little ahead of our time they were they were for sure ahead of their time yeah boy I mean you there are some places that you say the word and old Greenvillians will get nostalgic like no other and some of those places would be like Vince Pirone's or Ye Olde Fireplace huh or jeans or yeah Charlie's Steakhouse never on Sunday you know these places that were pillars in our city's food scene for so long family owned you know recipes that you can't taste anything like it anywhere else and you know they're just great aspects of our history and yeah the Old Green millions love that haha well I mean we all do I mean we all can think of places that we grew up going to that are just tied to our memories for sure for sure well thankfully despite having had some that have closed we still have a lot of fantastic options in the area and constantly I'm just amazed every time you know I might walk Main Street once a month and every time I walk down Main Street it's like okay I've never heard of this place you know it's just like constantly and I used to work on Main Street before I was a realtor I've worked with a business for almost 10 years and our office was on Main Street now this was starting from 2008 and Onward so a lot of Main Street was boarded up what right I would be walking Main Street and being like well at some point this will turn around and then of course it did now it's you know there's a now the city is kind of picky with its tenants you know they can yup they can pick and choose you know whether they want Lululemon to be there or not yup which the mayor has said it's one of their best producing stores in in the country is that one in downtown Greenville yeah he took I went to a presentation that he did where he's he said that which was that's incredible yeah again Greenville kind of punching above its weight but one last question okay and this isn't the if you're gonna say right now that's fine but if there was one era of Greenville's history that you could live in what would it be oh I might say the 1920s okay because that that is very similar to right now mm hmm you know Greenville is changing it's exploding we're you know economically very strong very vibrant all of that 100 years ago same thing 1920s the Roaring 20s I mean the country itself was you know pretty prosperous but that was when we were being called the textile center of the south and you know all these Mills were just churning yeah and there had to be an energy there had to be an energy in the city back then yeah our skyline was changing like it is now it was changing monthly or you know real regularly so I would say yeah 1920s okay if we could just have the 20s and not the 30s right that's exactly right alright John well where can people find you and I'm gonna include your information in the show notes but if they want to find more information about you or your business or anything like that where should they go Greenville History tours.com that's where all my ticketing is and you can see the schedule for all my tours yeah and I would say also the Greenville County Historical Society which we haven't really talked about greenvillehistory.org is the website and we got some exciting programming going on now and we have incredible resources for photos and maps and documents directories so we would love to get more people especially the younger crowd and middle aged you know to really become more involved in the nitty gritty history of that organization yeah absolutely well there you go oh and what I'll ask one more question about your business on your tours how many people do you typically take and are they typically can you if you've got you know a couple I assume that they can join with other couples or it can be like the entire group reserved if you can just explain that real quick yeah so you know with walking tours we can go up to 20 30 people but we'll take two people so two people's generally the minimum for tours but you know we'll get a lot of neighborhood groups friend groups social groups that will book out a tour or a whole van full of stuff for a private tour even but you know like say a food tour you know I would say six to 10 people would be pretty average okay for like a barbecue tour or chef table tour or something the history tours you know maybe two to six people on average but again you know I've done a lot more than that in groups so I always entertain you know whenever somebody wants a group yeah bring it on we'll do it okay sounds great well I think that's a great way to end it off so thank you so much John for your time and for just sharing all of that knowledge with everyone like I said if you're interested in connecting with John or doing one of his tours which I would highly recommend you can find his contact information in the show notes on whatever platform you're watching or listening to this on you can find mine as well if you need a realtor and please like rate and review subscribe all of those good things with the show thank you guys for watching listening we will talk to you next time!