Lugoff (pronounced LOO-goff) in Kershaw County is a small community a few miles west of the county seat of Camden. The town is named for a Russian count who was responsible for building the Seaboard Railway from Richmond, Virginia to Jacksonville, Florida. Lugoff was a stop along this line.
One of the community’s more famous landmarks is the 1948 Studebaker Champion that sits on top of what is now a laundromat. The classic car once graced Boykin’s Garage, a body shop owned by Herbert Frye Boykin. Boykin worked on Studebakers as well as any other make of car, and the property was sold after Boykin’s death. To honor Boykin and the landmark cherished by Lugoff residents, the new owners gave the car a makeover and replaced it on top of their new business.
The proper title is the Seaboard Air Line Railway, aka ‘SAL.’ The line through Lugoff was built in 1900 by an SAL subsidiary called the South Bound Railroad Company from Camden to Cayce. Today it is a CSX Transportation line and hosts Amtrak’s Silver Star.
The Studebaker pictured from Boykins’ Garage is a 1952 model – last year of that body style.