How did the boll weevil cause destruction in South Carolina in the 1920s? Question 7 options: In some years of the 1920s, half of the state's cotton crop was destroyed by the beetle. Throughout the 1920s, the boll weevil attacked insects that were responsible for cotton pollination. The beetle infested the rice plantations of the South Carolina lowcountry in the early 1920s. New state parks, created in the 1920s, proved to be vulnerable to attack by the beetle.