Before any Sears or Chick-fil-A opened on this property, the land was an army base. Camp Wadsworth operated here from 1917 to 1919 and trained American soldiers before they left to fight in the trenches of World War I.
The site, near what later became West Blackstock Road, sits about three miles southwest of downtown Spartanburg.
In 1972, Arlen Shopping Centers looked at the land and saw it as a place for a new retail development…