Over a year ago John Sherrer, director of Cultural Resources for the Historic Columbia Foundation, introduced a project called “Connecting Communities through History” to the residents of the Historic Heathwood community. On Tuesday May 11, Sherrer was back to provide an update on the project. Members of Historic Columbia Foundation will gather historic information from the communities in Columbia with interviews and photographs. There are six communities currently involved: Arsenal Hill, Cotton Town, Lower Waverly, Old Shandon, Hollywood Rosehill, and Heathwood.

According to Sherrer, from July 2 to August 15 the Historic Columbia Foundation will be conducting what Sherrer calls “the real intensive work” in the Heathwood community. During that time, Sherrer says the staff will generate information that will go into brochures for a walking tour. Sherrer says on May 15 the Historic Columbia Foundation will conduct a scanning day, an opportunity to collect photos from the six communities. The other dates are June 5, July 17, and August 14.

As part of this project, Sherrer said on October 31 Heathwood will be able to debut a waste side sign on the history of their neighborhood, which will be in Heathwood Park. For more information on this project visit www.Historic- Columbia.org, or call 252- 1770.

John Sadler, a member of the Boy Scouts of America Troop 10, gave a presentation of his discoveries from a project that he, his troop, and some volunteers from the neighborhood worked on in April. On two different Sundays, April 11 and 18, the troop and the volunteers took inventory of the trees in Heathwood, identified the tree types by measuring the circumference of each tree, and determined each tree’s condition. It took 81 man hours to complete this stage of the project; a final report will be given in September. Once the information is complete, Sadler will enter the information in GIS software. All this information will be given to the City of Columbia Tree Division so that they can provide better services and allow the Historic Heathwood Neighborhood to write a history on the trees in their neighborhood.