MYSTERY PHOTO: Lots of river rock

This is an interesting old building built from what appears to be river rock.  But where is it?  Bonus points:  Tell us some history about this building.  Send your best guess of what it is to feedback@statehousereport.com. And don’t forget to include your name and the town in which you live.

Our previous Mystery Photo

Our June 5 image, “Good porches with flag with less than 50 stars,” proved to be a ough mystery.  It showed the old Magnolia Hotel in Beaufort in a photo taken between 1860 and 1870.

Congratulations to all who correctly guessed, including George Graf of Palmyra, Va.; Mary Greene of Columbia; Henry Eldridge of Tega Cay; David Lupo of Mount Pleasant; Jacie Godfrey of Florence; and Frank Bouknight of Summerville.

Greene, who has relatives in Beaufort, scoured to find the answer and shared this: “This is a picture of the Anchorage on the left, Sea Island in the middle and Magnolia Hotel on the right.  Shows the Anchorage before the upper porch was added. Magnolia burned sometime before 1875, was replaced by a house that was moved from Barnwell Island in 1876, and then that house was moved again in 1975. The Wachovia/Wells Fargo bank is there now.  Anchorage is now back to being an Inn, Sea Island was torn down in 1959 to build the Sea Island Motel.”

Lupo added this: “The flag is puzzling. The stars appear to be in rows of six with each row directly below the one above it. Since at least five rows of stars are visible, that suggests the 30-star flag that was used 1848-1851. (What could be the start of a sixth row at the top must be a photographic artifact; there’s no flag with six rows of stars until 1890.)  States were being added to the union at a rapid rate in the mid-1800s, so it would not be surprising if the hotel didn’t update their flag immediately every time a star was added. The whitewashed tree trunks make it worth noting that South Carolinians were still whitewashing tree trunks in the middle of the 20th century, one hundred years after this photo was taken.”

• Send us a mystery:  If you have a photo that you believe will stump readers, send it along (but make sure to tell us what it is because it may stump us too!)  Send to:  feedback@statehousereport.com and mark it as a photo submission.  Thanks.