The Santee Chapter inherits its name from Santee Lodge #116, paying homage to the strong OA traditions from the greater Florence, SC area (and Pee Dee Area Council); however, the original namesake is the Santee tribe of native Americans. The story of the Santee tribe, like so many aboriginal tribes of South Carolina, is the story of the river on which they lived. Emptying into the Atlantic Ocean at Winyah Bay (see Chicora Chapter page), the Santee is the final course of the Catawba-Wateree-Santee River System, with its vast headwaters in the Carolina Blue Ridge Mountains. The Santee tribe lived in many villages along the middle course of the Santee River^[1], back along and up the banks of the Wateree. There they found a neighboring tribe, the Catawba, whose lands reached as far as Delaware, home to the Lenni Lenape tribe^[2]. The Santee name derived from the Catawban word “iswan'ti”, which translates to “the river” or “the river is there,”^[1] and historians suggest a close affinity between the Catawba and Santee people.^[3][4] So, perhaps it is fitting that the Santee Chapter serves the Atakwa District, as “atakwa” (or Ata’gwa) is the Cherokee word for a Catawba Indian^[4]. For posterity’s sake, it may be worth clarifying that the Santee tribe of South Carolina is unrelated to the Santee Sioux tribe of the Midwest (i.e., of Minnesota, S. Dakota, N. Dakota).^[5]