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GREENVILLE, S.C. ? After a day of lagging behind, organizers of Salt Lake City's 2002 Olympic relay hoped to get back on track Wednesday.
The flame traveled northeast and was expected to stay in Charlotte, N.C., Wednesday night.
When the flame arrives, racing legend Dale Earnhardt's widow, Teresa, will pass the flame to his son, Dale Earnhardt Jr., who will ignite the cauldron in downtown Charlotte.
Tuesday, a crowd of several thousand South Carolinians ? including former Salt Lake Mayor Deedee Corradini who carried the torch ? braved cold and the late hour to glimpse the Olympic flame.
And Salt Lake City's 2002 Olympic torch did finally enter downtown Greenville at 11:30 p.m. EST ? about two hours late.
"All the torch runners are heroes, and all of us who stuck around are heroes, too," Mayor Knox White said after the flame ignited a cauldron in the middle of the city's downtown Main Street festival.
One of those who waited was Jim Petersen, who hawked "unofficial" torch relay T-shirts to the crowd. While unofficial and unlicensed as Olympic memorabilia, the shirts sported designs eerily similar to SLOC's trademark crystal snowflake.
Peterson, along with several other "unofficial" vendors who sold anything from American flags to visors, followed the torch relay from Atlanta, stopping to sell their unlicensed wares to the crowds gathered to see the torch pass.
Business was best, Petersen said, in college towns such as Athens (home to the University of Georgia) and Clemson (home of South Carolina's Clemson University).
Salt Lake City should expect many such knock-off goods to be sold before and during its Winter Games, Petersen said.
"We're following (the torch relay) all the way to Salt Lake," he said.
Tackiness and tardiness aside, people seemed genuinely moved by the relay.
In Greenville, those who waited danced in the street to classic tunes like Van Morrison's "Brown-Eyed Girl" belting from the downtown party's sound system.
The large-screen television was filled with images of the crowd, and even the stand that sold $2 draft beer (which was supposed to close at 10:45 p.m.) stayed open late.
Still, many others were long gone as the torch lagged.
"I think all of us should have T-shirts that say 'I was there, I stuck it out,' " said local television sports anchor Geoff Hart, who emceed Greenville's festival.
And to their credit, many Greenville residents, including Corradini, did stick it out ? even if they weren't happy about it.
"Yeah, I'm mad" about the wait, said Laura Hodges, a 37-year-old nurse who, after working a 12-hour-day, had come to the downtown festival to see the torch. "But I'm staying. Oh heck, yeah, I'm staying. It's a once-in-a-lifetime experience."
For Salt Lake City's former chief, the experience was sweet. She was in Budapest, Hungary, when the International Olympic Committee announced in 1995 that Salt Lake City had won the bid for the 2002 Winter Games, and she brought the Olympic flag to Salt Lake City from Nagano, Japan, host of the 1998 Winter Olympics.
"To carry the torch was really a culmination of everything for me," said Corradini, who carried the flame a tenth of a mile about an hour before it entered the downtown festival. "It's just so exciting."
The torch's late arrival wasn't due to slow runners, rather it was delayed by a stop at Coca-Cola headquarters in Atlanta and a stop at a Chevrolet plant earlier in the day, a SLOC spokesman said.
"It's the first day. It'll be faster tomorrow," he said.
Coke and Chevy are the two sponsors of Salt Lake City's Olympic relay.
The atmosphere was slightly different in Greenville County during Atlanta's 1996 torch relay.
Then, Atlanta organizers decided the flame would have to travel in a van through the county because the County Commission had passed a resolution condemning homosexuality. Once Atlanta's torch entered Greenville's city limits, however, it was let out.
Back then, Atlanta organizers feared protests by gay activists. While the resolution was never repealed, SLOC had no such fears, and there were no signs of protest Tuesday.
A celebration similar to Greenville's was scheduled for Charlotte Wednesday night.
E-MAIL: bsnyder@desnews.com