Bailey Leaves Legacy of Encouragement and Compassion
Calvin Bailey grew up an only child in Union County with no connection to the forest industry. He figures his appreciation for the land had to come from the love of walking his family’s property in Lockhart every Christmas Eve with his father.
In high school he ran track and cross country, though he also enjoyed playing soccer, which wasn’t offered at the time. Calvin wanted to go to a small college that wasn’t far from home, so he chose Winthrop, where he eventually asked for a tryout with the soccer coach and made the team.
Calvin grew up going to every Clemson football game because his father had attended the university, and after two years he transferred to Clemson, getting involved in intramural soccer and changing his major to forestry. He said he knew he wanted to work outdoors, and he loved science, so forestry would give him that opportunity.
He spent two-and-a-half years at Clemson where he met his future co-workers Kenny Robertson, Roy Boyd, Lowe Sharpe and Russell Hubright. One summer Clavin and Kenny were interns at Sand Hills State Forest for Director Bob Beech. They lived in a trailer on Highway 1 and got their foot in the door at the Commission. Beech told them he would hire them after graduation, but a hiring freeze forced him to look elsewhere.
After a short stint with the Southern Pine Inspection Bureau (SPIB) where he learned to inspect lumber and grade and mark timber, Calvin responded to a Forestry Commission job opening as the project forester in Lexington County, which he began in 1986.
He remembers he was late on his first day of work because he had been given bad directions, and he got lost in Orangeburg. He remembers the first person he met and shook hands with was Coastal Region Communications Manager Mike Thomas.
“Back in those days foresters became firefighters tied to what then were called county rangers,” he said. “I became close to Ranger Homer Cook and would go to fires with him. I enjoyed it and started moving towards the fire side of things.”
Calvin left the agency briefly to work for Westvaco, but he returned just a year later to work as the Georgetown/Williamsburg project forester in what he remembers “was the most fire-prone district in the state – Berkeley, Clarendon, Georgetown and Williamsburg counties – saying it was a badge of honor to work there.
Against that backdrop, Calvin’s growing interest in the fire side of the agency’s mission began to flourish. But he also feels that God placed him in Williamsburg County for another reason…to find his wife. Kingstree was where he met Mary Kay, his wife of almost 36 years; they eventually had three sons, Trey, Stewart and Jim.
In May of 1991 Calvin started as the Walterboro District Forester. When the Commission reorganized into three regions in 1993, Calvin was named the Director of Operations Support for the Coastal Region under Regional Forester Bill Boykin. He was also asked to be the State Wildland-Urban Interface Coordinator in 2004, administering the Forestry Commission’s first iteration of the Firewise program. He was then promoted to Coastal Region Assistant Regional Forester under Cecil Campbell and on to Regional Forester in 2009, the position from which he retired.
Over the years Calvin has been on many out-of-state fire and prevention assignments, and he was also a member of the agency’s first incident management team, primarily as a Safety Officer. He was the chair of the agency’s Uniform Committee for more than 20 years and has assisted with the Wood Magic Forest Fair, Project Learning Tree and Military Appreciation hunts. Calvin became a Certified Public Manager in 2008 and was also the Eastern representative for the National Fire Weather Sub-Committee for several years and was instrumental in starting the forestry program for the Center for Heirs Property.
He has always been involved in agency activities as well as those outside of the agency. Calvin is a founding member of the Walterboro Soccer Club, also coaching all ages of girls and boys for 25 years; he also was on the City of Walterboro’s Tree Protection Committee.
Calvin said he’s seen lots of changes in the agency over the years, the biggest being was “when we reorganized in 1993. We went to three regions and closed the fire towers to go to aerial detection.”
Probably the worst fire he recounted working was a wildland-urban interface (WUI) fire in Bluffton that started from an escaped debris burn. “I learned a lot that day about how dangerous WUI was and knew it was going to be an issue that kept getting worse in South Carolina,” he said. I always worried what if a day came when our other regions couldn’t support another one having fires. We came close to that March 1 this year; it was pushing us to our limits.”
Not only is Calvin an accomplished firefighter and respected leader, but he is also a beloved character always ready with a well-timed joke or insightful anecdote, regularly punctuating gatherings and meetings with his trademark light-heartedness.
After 39 years, Calvin decided to retire from the Forestry Commission in 2025 to spend more time with his family, which now includes three grandchildren. Calvin also plans to decompress for a few months and “learn how to survive without two phones.”