Tar Kilns of Goose Creek State Park : History and Preservation

Abstract

Tar kilns are found throughout the Coastal Plain of North and South Carolina, remnants of a flourishing and important industry that exported tar across the Atlantic world. Tar production is the extraction of terpene from resinous trees by burning. In North Carolina, this was accomplished by burning or heavily resinous longleaf pine, also known as lightwood, in earthen kilns. The colonists encountered a unique forest suited to this purpose. This thesis explores the background of tar production in North Carolina though the context of the ecology of the longleaf forest, describes kiln preservation criteria, and makes the case that the kilns found in Goose Creek State Park form an important historical site as the vestiges of the plantation of Thomas Boyd, member of the Proprietor administration and Solicitor-General of the colony.