Category: Culture

You know those McCormick seasonings that you have stashed in your cupboard? The ones that probably should have been tossed and replaced five years ago? Easily half of our spices have the red, white, and blue McCormick label, and our funds help support the desperate research that Mr. William Hall is performing.

All day long, poor Mr. Hall must sit at his desk, teasipping and deciding which flavor, bouquet, and body combine for an ideal blend of tea. Once his palate is exhausted, he pauses to stare out his huge window that overlooks a busy Baltimore pier, where freighters unload cargo from exotic ports.

Nice work if you can get it.

But what, you ask, is even more curious than being a professional teasipper? How about the fact that there is in fact another William Hall currently running the Charleston Tea Plantation–and he is a third-generation tea taster.

If you are one of the many teetotalers among us, unable to visit the trendy wineries and breweries dotting the landscape, rest assured that you can visit the Charleston Tea Plantation instead. Get your sobering beverage fix on.

Per Charleston Living magazine,

 The Charleston Tea Plantation has become a tourist attraction, welcoming 75,000 visitors each year to see how tea plants grow and how the tea leaves are harvested and turned into a refreshing glass of iced tea or a warm comforting mug of hot tea.

“I wanted a place to educate people on tea,” Hall said.

Visitors can tour the factory, board a trolley to ride through the acres of historic tea plants and learn all about the rich history of tea in the Lowcountry.

Perhaps, like me, you’d prefer a brimming mug of coffee any morning over some watery hot tea, but the truth is that tea is the second most consumed beverage in the world after water. And Mr. Hall, who lives on the farm, is pretty happy about that.