“C” is for Cooper River

“C” is for Cooper River. The Cooper River and its tributaries drain much of the central portion of the lowcountry. The river flows out of Lake Moultrie, which is in turn fed by Lake Marion. The river combines with the Ashley to form Charleston harbor. English colonists named both rivers in honor of one of the Lords Proprietors, Lord Anthony Ashley Cooper. Cooper River rice planters assumed an important place in South Carolina politics. With the failure of rice culture in the early twentieth century, the banks of the Cooper River were turned to other purposes. There has been no single bigger developer of the Cooper than the U.S. Navy. In the twenty-first century the Cooper River has continued to be an industrial hub for the Charleston area and remained the center of the busy shipping industry.