Longtime Zesto co-owner to get honor in West Columbia. Here’s what we know
When passing Zesto of West Columbia and its large soft-serve ice cream cone sculpture in the future, you may be driving on a road named after the restaurant’s longtime co-owner Gus Manos.
The South Carolina General Assembly asked the state Department of Transportation to name the stretch of 12th Street between Knox Abbott Drive and Jarvis Klapman Boulevard after Manos. Zesto of West Columbia is located on the road, which will have signage.
State Rep. Micah Caskey, R-Lexington, proposed the resolution, which passed the House and Senate. He filed another resolution to rename a portion of Platt Spring Road in Springdale “Mayor Pat G. Smith Memorial Road,” after the town’s longest serving mayor, which was also approved by the General Assembly.
Manos, 88, died Dec. 19, 2025. He had been a co-owner of Zesto of West Columbia since 1961, according to his obituary.
Apart from running Zesto, Manos also served on the Springdale Town Council for 42 years and was mayor pro tem. He received the Order of the Palmetto from former Gov. Nikki Haley, a distinction recognizing lifetime service to the state.
“His influence lives on in the family he loved, the community he served, and the countless lives he touched through quiet leadership and unwavering values,” the House resolution renaming the West Columbia road says. “With a lifelong commitment of public service, it is only fitting and proper that a street in West Columbia be named in his memory.”
Pat G. Smith also died in 2025 at the age of 74. He was Springdale’s longest serving mayor for 29 years and a longtime director of the Wil Lou Gray Opportunity School, a state military-style alternative school for teenagers. Smith received the Order of the Palmetto and the Richard M. Kuffel Award for Excellence in Education.
A stretch of Platt Spring Road near Midlands Technical College, between Wattling Road and Rainbow Drive, will be named after Smith.
“It is only fitting and proper that the Honorable Pat G. Smith Jr., a man who dedicated his life to God, his family, and the community he loved is remembered with a road in the Town of Springdale named in his memory,” the resolution said.
A portion of Cedarcrest Drive in Lexington County will also be renamed to “Dedicated in the Honor of the Veterans of Lexington County.” Both chambers passed a resolution requested the Department of Transportation to rename the stretch between the 220th and 460th block of the street in western Lexington County for the Lexington VFW, or Veterans of Foreign Wars of the United States.