Five Points (Columbia, South Carolina)

Fountain in Five Points at night

Five Points in Columbia, South Carolina is a shopping, restaurant, and nightlife area that attracts customers from the nearby University of South Carolina and throughout the Columbia metropolitan area. It is the center for the city's annual St. Patrick’s Day Festival.

It was Columbia's first neighborhood shopping district, named for the intersection of Harden Street, Devine Street and Santee Avenue. It was home to Columbia's first supermarket[1] (an A & P), first Chinese restaurant[1] (Kester’s Bamboo House), and the first bar in South Carolina to serve a cocktail[1] (the Stage Door, which claimed to sell the state's first mixed drink after the South Carolina General Assembly approved the use of minibottles in 1973).

When streetcars were prevalent, Five Points was a hub (rotating circle) for moving between downtown Columbia and the residential area of Shandon.

In April 1993, Five Points was the site of the accidental death of Senator Strom Thurmond's daughter Nancy Moore Thurmond, who was hit by a drunk driver only feet from the limousine of South Carolina's lieutenant governor at the time, Nick Theodore.[2]

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 "Five Points: Looking back. Looking ahead". The State. March 11, 2005. Archived from the original on 2005-03-21. Retrieved 2010-12-18.
  2. ↑ Bass, Jack; Thompson, Marilyn W. (2005). Strom: The Complicated Personal and Political Life of Strom Thurmond. p. 305. ISBN 1-58648-297-1. Retrieved 2010-12-18. On the evening of April 13, 1993, Democratic Lieutenant Governor Nick Theodore was reading the directions on some medication as his highway patrolman driver pulled out of the Eckerd's drugstore parking lot onto Harden Street in Columbia's busy Five Points area. With its restaurants and coffee shops, the spot is a place of heavy evening foot traffic near the University of South Carolina campus. Theodore heard a dull thud. He looked toward the street and saw a car stop. A distraught woman driver got out, ran toward his car, and shouted through the window, 'I didn't mean to hit her. She stepped in front of my car.'

External links

Coordinates: 33°59′56″N 81°00′57″W / 33.998903°N 81.015903°W