DATE:    9/11/96
CONTACT: Bill Box, (803) 684-9919
WRITER:  Tom Lollis, (803) 284-3343

Third 4-H Center
In Birthing Stage

     SHARON -- The labor may be long, but the birthing has begun
for Clemson University Extension Service's third 4-H camp.
     It will be called the Matthews 4-H Environmental Learning 
Center, according to Bill Box, site director for the new camp. 
It will occupy 302 acres near the western York County town of
Sharon, on property donated to the Clemson University Foundation
by Mrs. Grace B. Matthews in 1985.
     "We are building this camp with private donations, not state 
funds," said Box. How quickly all the planned facilities are in
place depends on the success of the fund-raising effort.
     This fall is devoted to developing infrastructure. The S.C. 
National Guard has promised to help build roads. Water, sewer, a
restroom for day-use campers, a 1,500-square-foot shelter, a low
ropes course and a parking lot are also among first-stage
projects adding up to a $25,000 price tag.
     If fund-raising goes well, three other construction phases
should be complete some time in 1999.
     Box hopes to begin Phase II in the spring of 1997 -- adding
two cabins, a meeting room, a resident director's home, a
recreation area, maintenance facilities, two more shelters (1,000 
square feet each), a high adventure tower and course, furniture
and equipment. That is projected to cost around $437,500.
     Phase II will be closed out in spring of 1998 with the
addition of two more cabins, another shelter, ball fields and
recreation areas, road improvements and a pond, a rifle and
shooting range, a screened recreation building, a suspension
bridge over Turkey Creek, more restroom facilities and furniture
and equipment -- at a projected cost of $220,000.
     A multi-purpose dining hall will have to wait until spring
of 1999. Phase III also includes a swimming pool, two more
cabins, a camp office, two staff cabins, a covered recreation
area for volleyball and basketball, furnishings and equipment.
The price tag for Phase III is $812,000.
     Future construction, at a time to be determined, will
include a lodge and conference area, permanent bridges for Turkey
Creek, an outdoor amphitheater, picnic and camping areas, a skeet
range, a first aid station, a horse ring with seating area and
more cabins.
     Box already has a pledge of timber from Bowater Corp.,
100,000 board feet. The Arnold Emery sawmill will mill the timber
to the right size and then Southland Log Homes will cut it into
logs for the cabins free of charge.
      "All we'll have to pay for is cutting the timber -- between 
$7,000 and $8,000," says Lynn McClain, director of development 
for the College of Agriculture, Forestry and Life Sciences. She
is working with Box on raising funds for Matthews. She will
concentrate her efforts in York and surrounding counties.
     "We'll even go into the Charlotte area and look for
companies that are willing to contribute," said McClain.
     Matthews will be the first 4-H camp in the upstate. It will
be similar to W.W. Long Leadership Center in Aiken County, built
in 1934, and Bob Cooper 4-H Leadership Center at Summerton, built
in 1939.
     It will be a year-round camp for schoolchildren and other
groups to learn about forestry, agriculture, soil science, water
resources and wildlife conservation.
     A third camp is essential to the Teaching Kids About the
Environment program. Box said the South Carolina Coalition for
Natural Resource Education, which created Teaching KATE, has a
goal of reaching 20,000 youths annually by the year 2000.
     Box said the other two camps are expected to reach capacity
by the fall of 1997 or the spring of 1998.
                               END