Individual Collections

John A. Henneman mailed this letter from Spartanburg to
his cousin Balser Weber in Centre County, Pennsylvania on February 26, 1861.  He
was expecting that Fort Sumter would soon be bombarded.  Henneman served in the
Civil War as second lieutenant in Co. E, Holcombe Legion.  He was the owner of a
jewelry store in Spartanburg after the war.  In 1889 Henneman became mayor of
Spartanburg.  He was later killed in a domestic dispute when summoning a
policeman. 
View entire letter and transcript

This online collection of postcards currently contains
291 cards. 
These 291 cards represent only a small portion of the collection.  The entire collection of postcards, generously loaned by William Lynch
to the Libraries in order to be digitized, consists of approximately 1,500 cards and will
be displayed online in its entirety over the coming weeks.  More...

This collection of over 400 historical
photographs was donated by the Herald-Journal in 1999.  Most of the photographs
were taken by Alfred Tennyson Willis, a Spartanburg commercial photographer, and
date from the early 1900s to the 1940s.  Alfred’s son Robert Henry (Bob) Willis,
also a photographer, took many of the later photographs in the collection after
his father’s death in 1945. 
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Selections from the Willis Collection,
photographs by brothers Alfred and Henry Willis.  These images were discovered in
2003 by Elizabeth Willis Fowler, the daughter of Alfred Willis.  The original
negatives were cleaned and digitally scanned by Steve Fincher Photography.  The
negatives and digital files were given to the Spartanburg County Public
Libraries for storage and preservation.  More...

These photographs of Camp Croft were taken by
Joseph Peter Pizzimenti who was from Detroit, Michigan.  He was a musician in the
jazz and marching bands at Camp Croft from 1941 until early 1945.  He had
permission to carry a camera on base and used the darkroom on base to do his
work.  More...

The photographs by Randy Bradford from this collection of historical Spartanburg images are from the decade of the 1940s.  Bradford recorded important events, political leaders, and visiting celebrities.  His photographs also depict the everyday life and interests of Spartans from this era.  More...