South Carolina is a state in the Deep South of the United States which borders Georgia towards the south, North Carolina towards the north, and the Atlantic Ocean to the east. First part a of the Province of Carolina, the Province of South Carolina was amongst the thirteen colonies which declared independence from the British Crown in the American Revolution. The colony was first named by King Charles II of England in honor of his father Charles I, since Carolus is Latin for Charles. South Carolina was the first state to vote to secede from the Union and was the founding state of the Confederate States of America. Based on the 2010 United States Census, the state is ranked 24th amongst the U.S. states by population, at 4,625,384 people. South Carolina consists of forty six counties and its capital is Columbia.
During 2007, the state of South Carolina had an estimated gross state product of $153 billion, based on the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis. Its per-capita real gross domestic product or GDP in 2000, was $26,772 during the year 1997, and $28,894 during the year 2007; that represents 85% of the $31,619 per-capita real GDP for the United States on the whole in the year 1997, and 76 percent of the $38,020 for the United States during the year 2007.
South Carolina's key agricultural production is in the areas of tobacco, poultry, cattle, soybeans, dairy products, rice and hogs. Industrial production within the state of South Carolina consists of chemical products, textiles products,machinery, paper products, tourism and automobiles and automotive products.
South Carolina is bounded towards the north by the state of North Carolina; towards the south and west by the state of Georgia, situated across the Savannah River; and towards the east by the Atlantic Ocean.
South Carolina is composed of four geographic regions, or physiographic provinces, whose boundaries roughly parallel the Atlantic shore. In the southeast area of the state is the Coastal Plain, that can be divided into the Outer and Inner Coastal Plains. Beginning from north to south the shoreline is divided into three separate areas, the Grand Strand, the Santee River Delta, and the Sea Islands. Further inland are the Sandhills, ancient dunes from what used to be South Carolina's shoreline millions of years ago. The Fall Line, which marks the limit of navigable rivers, runs along the boundary of the Piedmont and the sandhills, that has rolling hills and clay soils. Within the northwest corner of the state of South Carolina are the Blue Ridge Mountains, the smallest geographical part in South Carolina.
There are a lot of estuaries and salt marshes along South Carolina's coastline, in addition to the natural ports at Georgetown and Charleston. The coastal plain has a large number of Carolina bays, which is an unusual feature, with their exact origins being uncertain. One prominent, but incorrect theory says that they were created by a meteor shower. The bays tend to be oval, lining up in a northwest to southeast orientation. The terrain is flat and the soil is composed completely of recent sediments like silt, clay and sand. Parts with better drainage make great farmland, even if some land is swampy.