Golf carts are high in the news. Save all that gas money! You can buy an electric one for as little as $1,750 or a gasoline-powered model for $800 more. An average model with many fancy options costs around $8,500.

You can’t drive it on main thoroughfares (Broughton St.) and highways (301), according to Mike Stillinger, proprietor of Eagle Golf Cart Sales and Service. But you can tool around within two miles of your home on back roads and streets. And haul anything from golf clubs to fertilizer to a bagged turkey to a bunch of kids.

A S.C. permit is required. And every cart, any price, has to have headlights, brake lights, a horn and a rear view mirror. Turn signals are optional. Lastly, it’s illegal for any unlicensed driver or child to drive one on any street.

Think about the ease and economy of going to a nearby job, to the grocery store, the doctor’s office or out to the golf course on a smidgen of gasoline or electric charge. One charge carries you up to 30 miles, one tank of six gallons over 100. This thought is what intrigues millions of Americans and some here in Orangeburg are coming up with new uses every day.

Let’s go huntin’Charles Thompson, drug store proprietor, runs two on his place on Farnum Road to pull trailers hauling seeds, animal food, tools and nearly everything else farmers use. At the beach, he and his family go for joy ride after joy ride along the surf and dunes.

Contractor Coleman Farr has a cabin on family land down near Smoaks. Come hunting season, he and good friends are plowing through the woods and swamps to their favorite stands. They hide the carts then sequester themselves at favorite spots waiting for that deer or wild turkey to stroll into view. Carrying the game back is so much easier.

Last season, the carts began showing up more and more at football games. Charles says he’s seen a number of fans drive into the parking lot at Carolina stadium towing one. After parking, they unhitch it, get on with a drink cooler and ride, not walk, to a special parking lot close to the entrance.

Just the beginningAnd this is just the beginning. Visitors to the Veteran’s Hospital in Columbia no longer strive to park so near the main entrance. Just a minute or two of waiting and a bus-like, enlarged cart pulls up and drives them there. When they emerge, it stops and rides them back to their vehicles. Some of our sprawling college campuses now use them to transport students from Chemistry II to Clothes Design I.

With the hundreds of new golf courses laid out in South Carolina in the last decade, cart sales have more than tripled, Mike says. Some order 50 to 60 at a clip. Our manufacturing plants are also big customers. Albemarle Corp. on the Cannon Bridge Road keeps 50 carts busy carrying employees and accessories to and from work at inside sites.

Most are assembled at what is now designated as the Golf Cart Capital of America, Augusta, Ga., where “E-Z-Go” and “Club Car” put together hundreds of thousands every year.

“No question, as they continue saving 75 to 80 percent of the fuel or energy requirement of an automobile, this popularity is going to continue,” Mike says. And the manufacturers and designers have lost no time in adding many more conveniences to enhance their rides. They now offer folding, rainproof tops; heavy plastic sides; heaters; air conditioners and CD players.

“Their future looks rosy indeed,” Mike says. “As they continue to improve, we may see commuters driving them to and from work, and shoppers loading them up at the supermarket. And of course, courting couples out joyriding -- makes you want to be 18 again.

Retired editor and public relations executive Thomas Langford’s column is titled “Some Edisto stories.” Let him know if you have stories to share: 803-534-2097.

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