How a ‘salt-of-the-earth’ guy from Rock Hill got a bridge named after him
Jack Armour wasn’t some famous statesman. He wasn’t a millionaire philanthropist. Folks in his long-time home of Rock Hill may not quickly recognize his name.
So as South Carolina and York County work to name a local bridge after him, just who was Jack Armour?
“Complete salt of the earth is who he was,” said granddaughter Lisa Pope. “He was just Jack.”
Armour, who died in 2008 at age 79, had his name appear in front of the state General Assembly this spring. The legislature agreed to name the Mount Holly Road bridge over Taylor Creek the Jack Armour Memorial Bridge. Markers will go up soon.
That’s happening all because Armour couldn’t keep to himself several decades ago, and a local husband saw an opportunity to give the best gift ever.
Jack Armour, a Rock Hill story
Jack Armour’s story is a bit of a time capsule.
The Lincolnton, North Carolina, native worked more than 40 years at Rock Hill Printing & Finishing when the textile mill was one of the few major employers in the city. His wife of 50 years, Wilma, worked there for 45 years in the packing department.
Armour wore a trademark belt buckle, his preferred one an oval and cross with “Take Time for Jesus” written on it. He took pride in his 56-year perfect attendance record in Sunday School at Mount Holly United Methodist Church. Armour lived most of his life before cell phones, so he talked to people.
It was a challenge, then, when Wilma was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease a few years before she died in 1997. Armour chose to take care of her at home. The family hired someone from church to stay with Wilma a few hours each morning so Armour could get groceries or run errands. About that time, road work began.
A bridge replacement tied up traffic on Mount Holly Road for close to a year. Instead of letting it frustrate him, Armour walked down to meet the construction crew. Then he returned, almost daily. They’d congregate at the bridge three quarters of a mile from Armour’s home.
“The man just had to get out and still be with people,” Pope said. “He decided he was going to go down there and make friends with everybody that was working on it.”
One Saturday, crews knocked on Armour’s door. The bridge was ready. They wanted Armour to drive it first, but a friend of his already had a van parked and ready to go.
”The way the story goes is, the crew kind of asked Paw Paw’s friend to let Paw Paw get in the front,” Pope said. “The story is both of them were racing to be the first to go across the bridge.”
SC bridge names and local stories
The state legislature makes decisions to name roads, bridges or monuments.
There are massive bridges like the Arthur Ravenel Jr. Bridge in Charleston, named for the late Congressman and businessman. There are historic bridges like Campbell’s Covered Bridge in Greenville, named for long ago grist mill owner Alexander Lafayette Campbell.
Occasionally, something interesting enough happens at a bridge for the state to take notice. More than a dozen years ago the Sutton Road bridge over Interstate 77 in Fort Mill became the Patriot Leonard A. Farrington 9/11 Memorial Bridge.
Farrington, who lived in Rock Hill, responded to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks by pulling out an American flag and waving it for hours at the bridge. He returned for a decade on each anniversary of the attacks. Locals, bikers and others often joined Farrington, who died in 2012, to wave their own flags.
Armour’s connection to a relatively obscure bridge on Mount Holly Road likely would’ve been lost, except that Jason Pope heard the story too often to forget it.
Surprise birthday gift in Rock Hill
Jason, Lisa’s husband, got a reminder of that story each time he crossed the Mount Holly Road bridge with her. She’d joke it was the Jack Armour bridge. Jason got an idea.
He researched. He wrote. He submitted what he found. Naming a bridge takes help from state legislators. Luckily for Jason, he knew one.
His uncle Tommy Pope is Speaker Pro Tempore for the state House of Representatives. He represents most of northwest York County. The Republican filed a bill in December to name the bridge after Armour. The House adopted it in February, and the Senate concurred at the end of April.
“Uncle Tommy,” as Lisa Pope calls him, came by unexpectedly on June 1 with a framed notice. It was the first Lisa had heard anything about naming a bridge. It also was her birthday.
“Nobody can ever top this gift,” she said.
The bridge is small, passed over in an instant by more than 13,000 vehicles daily. It’s a tiny piece of Rock Hill that’s easily lost in the constant bustle of a growing community.
But now, its namesake won’t be.
“It’s not a major, big bridge,” Lisa said. “But it’s the Jack Armour Bridge. And I love it.”
This story was originally published June 9, 2025 at 5:30 AM.
