Pendleton Swears in New Mayor
Greg Wilson/Anderson Observer
On a crisp Monday morning in Pendleton, the kind of early-winter chill when the air seems to sharpen the edges of the old brick storefronts, the town gathered to swear in its new mayor, Sarah Stokowski.
The ceremony itself was modest—an oath repeated, a Bible held steady by outgoing Mayor Frank Crenshaw, a confident voice of someone who had spent weeks knocking on doors and now found all those living-room conversations distilled into a single, public moment.
“I couldn’t imagine a better place than here,” said Stokowski, who moved to the town just over five years ago. “We have the best community, and this is the best small town in America.”
Pendleton, at such times, feels less like a modern municipality than a careful continuation of something begun long ago. Laid out in 1790 as the seat of the old Pendleton District, the town has kept its original plan with near-stubborn fidelity: a village green at the center, flanked by 18th- and 19th-century buildings that look as if they were arranged once and then politely left alone. The entire town now sits on the National Register of Historic Places, a designation that acknowledges not only its architecture but its role as a former judicial, social and commercial hub for what would become Anderson, Oconee and Pickens Counties.
Inside or just off that same green where early justices once oversaw the affairs of a frontier district, the new mayor joined a line of local officeholders stretching back more than two centuries. The language of the oath—vowing to uphold the Constitution, to serve the people, to discharge the duties of the office—has changed little since the days when dogwoods were first planted along the streets and Farmers Hall doubled as courthouse and gathering place. Outside, beyond the walls, the town’s historic homes, churches and old general store stood in their familiar places, as if to remind the new administration that in Pendleton, every fresh promise is made in the long shadow of everything that came before.
