Legend has it that throughout the low country, there was never an unmarried daughter at the home that had a joggling board. It's where Grandfather proposed to Grandmother, where the old gang sang together - or where important decisions of state were made.
I discovered the Old Charleston joggling board during my first visit to South Carolina. Turns out it has been part of low-country life since the early 1800s and is still seen on porches, piazzas and in gardens throughout the low country.After going through one of Charleston's historic houses, I tried the board out after the tour guide explained the concept - gentle exercise, fun, reflection or relaxation.
I sat on it and bounced. It was slightly reminiscent of a teeter-totter - or a see-saw, as they call it in the Northeast - but much more gentle. Then several people sat on it at once, and we rocked back and forth. I couldn't believe that a single board held up on either end by rockers could take so much abuse.
This Charleston green board is 16 feet long and 29 inches from the ground, so it takes some space in your back yard. If your yard or porch is too small to accommodate it, you can get a bench that is only 10 feet long and 20 inches from the ground - similar to chair height.
It's made of yellow pine, the glue is waterproof and the Charleston Green paint is of high quality outdoor enamel. The rockers and uprights are pressure treated and the long board is dip treated.
Legend says that the first joggling board - at least in America - was built at Acton Plantation in Sumter County near Stateburg, S.C. The plantation was built in 1803 by Cleland Kinloch near Georgetown, S.C. When Kinloch's wife died, his sister, Mrs. Benjamin Kinloch Huger, came to Acton to care for the household.
She suffered from rheumatism. One day she wrote to her relatives at Gilmerton, Scotland, telling them how the family had removed a side of her carriage so her chair could be lifted into it, thus allowing her to go for a ride. This was all the exercise she could manage.
So her sympathetic Scottish cousins sent a model of a joggling board and told her if she sat on it and bounced gently, she would get more exercise. After the plantation carpenter built one, she loved it.
From this modest American beginning, the boards spread quickly to the yards and piazzas until they became as common as swing sets of a later day.
Unfortunately, at the end of World War II, the high-quality timber needed for the boards became harder to acquire, and the cost of labor made the hand-fashioning prohibitive. Soon the boards were scarce.
During the Tricentennial celebration in South Carolina in 1970, the Old Charleston Joggling Board Co. was founded with a vow to resurrect this great tradition of plantation America. It worked, and the boards started springing up again all over the South.
They were not only a fun addition to any back yard or porch, they were great conversation pieces. Some of us Westerners should import a few of them and start a Utah joggling tradition.
If you're interested, just write The Old Charleston Joggling Board Co. 652 King St., P.O. Box 20608, Charleston, SC 29413, or call (803) 723-4331. The company will send a price list, and when you order the board, it will be sent freight collect from the warehouse.
Southerners say children love joggling boards and can play on them as aggressively as they choose - or older people can go for the gentle bounce that produces peace and serenity.
There have been numerous important chats on those boards, symbolic of the more reflective, genteel society of Southern life.
I'll take joggling to jogging any day.