Air Conditioning and Refrigeration Repair in Summerville, SC

A longstanding Summerville restaurant "temporarily closed" during the pandemic has been demolished to make way for a new business — but anyone wishing for it to become another dining spot is out of luck.

The Shoney's at 1307 N. Main St. will be replaced by a bank after years of vacancy and a round or two with graffiti artists. A victim of the pandemic, the chain posted a "Temporarily Closed due to COVID-19" sign out front in 2020 but never reopened.

First National Bank of Pennsylvania filed its first legal notice in 2022 requesting to build a branch on the property, and it reapplied last month.

Community members were abuzz when the demolition work was underway on Dec. 17. The nearly 800 comments ranged from "It's about time!" to "What's coming?" People also shared hopes the "eyesore" building would be replaced by another family-style restaurant or a coffee shop while others pleaded for no more car washes.

The Pittsburgh-based bank's future Flowertown office will be next to Panera Bread and Bojangles within the same shopping center as Belk and Walmart.

And it will face direct competition for loans and deposits. A Chase branch operates across the street and a South State outpost is two businesses down.

Shoney's dates back to 1947 when Alex Schoenbaum opened the Parkette Drive-In in West Virginia.

News archives show the Southern-style chain opened its first Charleston location in 1966 on Savannah Highway in West Ashley. Shoney's expanded to Summerville by the mid-1970s though not at 1301 N. Main, which the company sold in 1997 for $1.3 million. The property is now owned by a San Diego-based real estate investment firm, according to Berkeley County land records.

Shoney's hit financial troubles and shuttered or sold 104 restaurants in 1999. The company then filed for bankruptcy protection before a private equity group bailed the brand out in 2002, but the reprieve was short-lived. In 2015, another 72 locations closed and nine more were sold.

At its peak, the chain operated several restaurants across the Charleston region but all are now closed. South Carolina is still home to several Shoney's, in Columbia, Myrtle Beach, Sumter, Orangeburg, Hartsville and Florence.

ORANGEBURG, S.C.

The Dutch Fork football dynasty rolls on.

The Silver Foxes captured their third straight championship and ninth overall with a 35-21 victory on Friday over Summerville in the Class 5A Division I title game at S.C. State’s Oliver Dawson Stadium.

All nine of Dutch Fork’s championships have come since 2013. The title is head coach Tom Knotts’ 16th of his career. He won seven championships in North Carolina before taking over the Dutch Fork program in 2011.

Dutch Fork’s nine state championship tie them for sixth all-time in state history with Clinton, which won the 2A championship on Thursday. Knotts’ nine state championships in S.C. are one behind former Summerville’s John McKissick and Willie Varner’s 10 titles.

“There was a good foundation when I got here. We just needed to take it over the top, and I think we have done that,” Knotts said. “The climb to the top of the mountain is much easier than staying on the top. We got to find ways to innovate and keep them motivated.”

Knotts will find ways from Friday’s game to keep the team motivated. He admitted he wasn’t pleased with how his team played near the end of the game with several penalties but said “They will be addressed.”

Dutch Fork battled through all kinds of challenges last season in wining the title, but this year’s championship largely happened more in dominant fashion. The Silver Foxes wrapped their fifth perfect season and used a record-setting defense to do it.

“All summer we’ve been putting in that work to not go 0-3 again, not go 10-5,” Dutch Fork running back Maurice Anderson said. “We wanted to do the season undefeated and finish. It feels great.”

Dutch Fork recorded a school-record six shutouts and had given up just 73 points coming into the championship game. The 94 points given up this season ties the school record mark set in 2020, which was done in just 10 games.

Quarterback Ethan Offing threw for 252 yards and two touchdowns on Friday. The junior Clemson baseball commit missed last year’s title game with an injury but shined in moments against the Green Wave.

Anderson rushed for 146 yards and three touchdowns. It was Anderson’s fourth 100-yard rushing game of the season.

Summerville, which was making its first title appearance since 2007, tested the vaunted Silver Foxes in every way. Dutch Fork trailed 14-6 in the second quarter after Jayven Williams’ 43-yard touchdown run early in the second quarter.

But Dutch Fork answered when Offing hit Boykin Bickley on a 19-yard TD pass. Bickley finished with seven catches for 149 yards.

“We have good chemistry together, and it paid off,” Offing said of Bickley. “He’s a great player. College coaches pick him up. He is dynamic.”

The Silver Foxes took a 21-14 lead on Anderson’s 8-yard run with 1:53 left in the second quarter.

Summerville played much of the game without starting quarterback Jaden Cummings, who left the game with an apparent knee injury near the end of the first quarter. The Dartmouth signee and North-South all-star selection came into the game with 2,329 yards and 30 touchdowns.

Cummings had an 18-yard pass to Jaiden Kelly-Murray to put Summerville up 7-6 in the first quarter.

Cummings was replaced by junior Cooper Kafina, who played well in the senior’s absence. Kafina hit a wide open Kelly-Murray on a 77-yard touchdown pass to cut Dutch Fork’s lead to 28-21 with 6:28 left in the third.

Summerville got the ball back on its own 20 with 7:07 left and a chance to go down and tie the game. But Dutch Fork’s Julian Walker had pair of sacks and forced a Green Wave punt.

“We needed to make a play to end that game the way it did,” Walker said. “They were driving down the field on us with big plays, so we were like go make the stop and that is what we did.”

The Silver Foxes sealed it on the next drive as Anderson scored on a 38-yard touchdown run with 2:07 left.

“We knew we were a great team, so we needed to keep fighting and keep playing hard. That’s what we did,” Offing said.

First Quarter

DF —Anderson 8 run (kick failed), 10:48

S — Kelly Murray 18 pass from Cummings (Kelley kick), 5:32

Second Quarter

S — Williams 43 run (Kelley kick), 11:31

DF — Bickley 19 pass from Offing (Westbrook pass from Offing), 8:00

DF — Anderson 8 run (Welch kick), 1:53

Third Quarter

DF — Bickley 20 pass from Offing (Welch kick), 7:34

S — Kelly-Murray 77 pass from Kafina (Kelley kick), 6:28

Fourth Quarter

DF — Anderson 38 run (Welch kick), 2:07

INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS

RUSHING — DF: Anderson 16-146; Offing 11-22; Johnson 2-11; Smith 1-7. S: Williams 22-133; Kelly-Murray 3-12.

PASSING — DF: Offing 12-23-0 252; Smith 0-1-0. S: Kafina 13-27-2 173; Cummings 2-4-0 33.

RECEIVING — DF: Bickley 7-149; Smith 3-72; Anderson 2-31. S: Kelley-Murray 7-152; Deweese 3-29; Guinn 2-18; Williams 2-2.

This story was originally published December 13, 2024, 5:43 PM.

SUMMERVILLE — Summerville reminds Nico Romo of what Charleston used to look and feel like 15 years ago.

The city of more than 50,000 is growing, with another 47,000 residents expected to move to the area by 2030. But its leaders are approaching those changes thoughtfully, Romo said.

“They want to continue developing the area without destroying it,” he said.

Part of that work includes restoring historic buildings like the one at 117 W. Luke Ave., home to Romo’s new wedding venue and café.

Food

The Kersey House will open in January with a daytime menu of French-inspired cuisine. Romo, owner of popular local restaurants NICO Oysters + Seafood, Bistronomy and Laura, hopes to host his first private event at the 300-plus-person capacity venue shortly after.

Renovations of the 112-year-old property were led by Christopher Karpus of Karpus Design, who worked to maintain and accentuate the structure’s historical features.

“You want to really show as much respect as you can for what has been,” Karpus said. “That’s why you invest in a property like this.”

Romo hopes to capitalize on the flourishing wedding industry in the Charleston area, the second-most-popular destination to get hitched in the U.S. The two-story Kersey House features a ballroom, bar and brand new kitchen on the first floor, where Romo’s team will prepare food for weddings and other private events.

Guests are greeted by two large verandas and a tribute to his wife's side of the family, the Kerseys. The venue's four grand parlor rooms feature original heart pine floors, fireplaces and other special design details.

The second story, framed by a wraparound porch, is home to bridal suites, where members of the wedding party can change and freshen up. The inside of the home can hold about 100 guests. Outside, a covered area with azaleas, hydrangeas and its own bar expands Kersey House’s capacity to nearly 400, Romo said.

Important to the chef was maintaining the character of the building, whose renovated rooms are named after members of the Kersey family. Karpus helped him achieve those goals while bringing the property up to present day building codes.

“The challenge (was) connecting all of that together while maximizing the use of the property,” Karpus said. “It was kind of a puzzle really.”

The café side of the business, which will open 11 a.m.-8 p.m., brings a new lunch and dinner option to Summerville. Its opening menu will feature French onion soup, a pickled shrimp salad, baked escargot with brioche, a croque monsieur and a signature burger with white cheddar. Larger plates include steak frites, mussels, duck confit and risotto with bay scallops.

The opening of Kersey House marks a return to the event space for Romo, who worked for Patrick Properties Hospitality Group for more than a decade. During that time, he launched the kitchen and culinary programs at Lowndes Grove, the group’s Wagener Terrace wedding venue. He also helped curate philanthropic events, which he intends to make part of the programming at the Kersey House.

Nico Romo Hospitality Group isn’t the only Charleston-based, restaurant-focused hospitality company to recently step into the wedding space. The forthcoming wedding venue at 94 Stuart St. in Charleston is a new concept from the minds behind Bodega, Uptown Social, Share House and the upcoming neighborhood tavern By The Way.