Pelzer is a town in Anderson County in South Carolina, United States, along the Saluda River. The population was 89 at the 2010 census.

As of 2010 the town was governed by a mayor and four council members. The current Mayor is William Ragland.

Pelzer was founded in the 19th century as a mill town on several mill sites (the Lower Mill and the Upper Mill) on the Saluda River developed by the Pelzer Manufacturing Company. The first (lower) mill was completed in 1882; two other expansions were referred to as mills 2 and 3, with construction of the 4th mill (the upper mill) starting in 1896. Pelzer Manufacturing drew facility from two dams built along the Saluda River, which generated knack with the put happening to of the first generators ever sold by General Electric. The factory was the first in the country to use burning lighting.

The company and town were named for Francis J. Pelzer, who surveyed sites along the river and laid out the town and was along following William Lebby and Ellison A. Smyth one of the founders of Pelzer Manufacturing. The first president and treasurer of the company was Ellison Adger Smyth, who held the corporate titles for 43 years. When Smyth established to construct the fourth mill, he initially chosen a site four miles downriver from the town along a shoal, necessitating construction of a additional mill town. Eventually, however, Smyth arranged to build a supplementary mill at Pelzer and began construction at the Upper Mill site, with faculty generation coming from the downstream shoals and dam. This was the first instance of a mill in South Carolina not built sharply adjacent to its faculty generation facility; Smyth established General Electric to construct the facility lines between the additional dam and the existing town, a first in the industry that many competitors argued was doomed to fail. Smyth allowed GE to use the new Upper Mill as a testing arena for additional electric generators and motors, which initially cost Pelzer Manufacturing maintenance and made the further mill a allowance loser for several years, though it did become profitable in time.