This travel article from the South Carolina Department of Parks, Recreation and Tourism provides a description of Ashley River Road, traveled since 1691, and was the link to the homes of some of Charleston’s most prominent families, including Drayton Hall, Magnolia Plantation and Middleton Place. On this road, large farms— or plantations—produced cotton, rice, indigo and the lore that has fed much of the world’s views of the antebellum South. Today this stretch of Highway 61 is a National Scenic Byway stretching from Church Creek to SC Highway 165.