Fair Play, SC

Fair Play is an Oconee County census-designated place in the southern corner of South Carolina, with a small portion extending into Anderson County. The 2020 census counted 704 residents. The community stretches from its inland crossroads south to Lake Hartwell and the Georgia line, with Interstate 85 and South Carolina 11 shaping the larger map. The result is a place that still reads as rural farm country as lake roads, highway traffic, and development pressures meet around it.

Fair Play’s old economy centered on farms, sawmills, and gristmills. Lake Hartwell changed the landscape in the 1960s, flooding parts of the Tugaloo River valley, rerouting roads, and turning the southern edge into a shoreline community. Oconee County’s Fair Play planning work grew out of residents organizing through the Fair Play Community Association, especially as I-85 brought new development attention. Today Seneca and Anderson handle most larger errands, while the community’s daily map runs from working fields and small crossroads to lake neighborhoods and the interstate. Fair Play is a rural corner with a reservoir-era second chapter.