Once a plantation, then a winter home for a Wall Street investor, and now an environmental education center, Hobcaw Barony (22 Hobcaw Rd., 843/546-4623, www.hobcawbarony.org, hours and prices vary) is one of the more unusual stories of the Lowcountry.

Its name comes from a Native American word meaning “between the waters,” an allusion to its location on the Waccamaw Neck, the beginnings of the Grand Strand itself. By 1718 the surrounding land comprised various rice plantations, among South Carolina’s earliest, staying in operation through the end of the 1800s.

Hobcaw entered its modern period when 11 of the former plantations were purchased en masse in 1905 by Wall Street investor Bernard Baruch, a South Carolina native who wanted a winter residence to escape the brutal Manhattan winters. Presidents and prime ministers came to hunt and relax on its nearly 18,000 acres.

Fifty years later Baruch died, and his progressive-minded daughter Belle took over, immediately wanting to open the grounds for university and scientific research. Still privately-owned by the Belle W. Baruch Foundation, much of Hobcaw Barony is open only to researchers, but the Hobcaw Barony Discovery Center (843/546-4623, www.hobcawbarony.org, Mon.–Fri. 9 a.m.–5 p.m., free) has various exhibits on local history and culture, including Native American artifacts and a modest but fun aquarium with a touch tank.

To experience the rest of Hobcaw Barony, you must take one of the various themed, guided tours (call for times and days). The basic Hobcaw tour ($20) takes you on a three-hour van ride all around the grounds, including the main Hobcaw House, historic stables, and the old slave quarters, with an emphasis on the natural as well as human history of the area. Other special tours include “Birding on the Barony” ($30), “Christmas in the Quarters” ($20), and a catch-and-release fly-fishing tour ($250) of local waters.