Myrtle Beach contingent greeted by love, friendliness at Women’s March on Washington

Cathy Laney, 64, of Myrtle Beach, climbed onto the bus at the Springfield Mall in Springfield, Virginia, on Saturday night energized from her long day in the nation’s capital. But she didn’t spend the day shopping.

Instead, she had spent her time participating in the Women’s March on Washington, part of the Myrtle Beach contingent.

“I’ve never been so proud of my fellow Americans,” she said as she found her spot on the bus for the nine-hour ride back to Murrrells Inlet, where the night before 40 women and one man – ranging in age from 15 to over 70 – had boarded the official Myrtle Beach bus for the trip to Washington, D.C.

The bus was one of 15 from South Carolina. While about 2,000 people from the Palmetto State traveled by the buses chartered by the Women’s March on Washington’s South Carolina division, other Grand Strand area residents drove, flew or took the train.

Bernadine Lamar of Conway was among the bus passengers.

“We came to uplift women and the marginalized,” she said, explaining why she traveled to Washington for the event that drew a crowd estimated at anywhere from 300,000 to 500,000.

“We did not encounter a single negative person – not one,” she marveled.

On the contrary, she and her group found themselves on the receiving end of support from a stranger.

As her group of five friends was enjoying wine before dinner at Maggiano’s Little Italy, the women got to talking with the bartender, a graduate of Coastal Carolina University. When they went to pay for their meal, they found that someone who had overheard the conversation had picked up the tab.

When Victoria Lozano and Kevin Clegg – Clegg was the sole man on the bus – were waiting for the march from the rally point at Third and Independence Avenue to start, Lozano realized she needed to find a restroom. But the lines were long.

A woman nearby started talking with the couple and had welcomed them to Washington.

“She lived in Washington and was really proud of her city,” Lozano said. “She offered to take us to her house and let me use her bathroom. I said ‘no,’ but I realized after a while that I really wasn’t going to be able to wait much longer for an empty spot at the temporary toilets.

“So we called the woman, Maya, an immigrant from Persia. She welcomed us into her home, gave us tea, let us use her bathroom. We were strangers.”

Lamar, a retiree from the Social Security Administration, said that she also was impressed by the positive messages on the placards carried by some of the marchers. “I think that women of a certain age have a positive way of looking at things. We’re polite, we’re active, but we show our love,” she said.

Laney, an Army and Air Force veteran, said it was her interest in environmental issues that spurred her to demonstrate in Washington.

“The opposition to global warming and other environmental issues just left me aghast,” said Laney, a member of the Sierra Club who is active with the Winyah Rivers Foundation and the Waccamaw Riverkeeper. “We’ve come so far in America, but we have so far to go.”

This story was originally published January 22, 2017 at 4:53 PM with the headline "Myrtle Beach contingent greeted by love, friendliness at Women’s March on Washington."