Friends of the Georgetown Library schedule Yuletide Home Tour on Dec. 14 to fund children’s programs; sculpture project nearing goal

Bob Willey, president of the Friends of the Georgetown Library, outlined the Yuletide Home Tour scheduled for Dec. 14 from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m., noting the tour features 11 homes in Georgetown’s historic district plus participating museums and two churches.

Willey said the tour supports the Friends’ principal annual fundraiser, with proceeds directed to children’s reading programs at the Georgetown County Library system. He described use of funds for visiting programs and minimized administrative costs so more proceeds benefit programming.

Ticketing options are online via the Friends website event page or in person at any Georgetown County library branch through the Friday before the event. Willey said regular admission is $25 per person and that Friends-group members at any branch pay $20 per person. He encouraged participants to plan time for a museum or lunch and noted St. Mary’s Roman Catholic Church will be open only from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. because of a 5 p.m. mass.

Willey also described a fundraising campaign for a children’s-library statue commissioned from sculptor Wesley Wofford. He said the statue will be roughly 38–40 inches tall, designed for children to touch and see, and will reference correspondence linking Harriet Tubman and James Bowley (the transcript contains variant spellings of that surname). Willey said the Friends are about two-thirds of the way to the funds needed to commission the statue and place it on a pedestal with interpretive material.

Willey listed partnering museums (the Kaminsky House, the Gullah Museum and the Georgetown County Museum) and previewed the museum’s upcoming South Carolina 250 exhibit that will include a Francis Marion letter already on display. He encouraged community support for the tour as a way to benefit library programming and local cultural organizations.