South Carolina from A to Z

“M” is for Mount Zion College. Established in 1777 the institution started in a small log building as an all grades public school in Winnsboro. In 1785, the South Carolina legislature officially chartered the school as Mount Zion College one of three colleges it chartered on the same day. The all-male Mount Zion College, which included a great deal of elementary and preparatory learning for use of...

“M” is for Mount Pleasant (Charleston County; 2020 population 90,801). Mount Pleasant was a small village until the 1970s, when it began a dramatic expansion to become the fourth largest municipality in South Carolina. Lying on the north side of Charleston harbor, Mount Pleasant occupies what was formerly Christ Church Parish. James Hibben laid out the village in 1803 on the site of Jacob Motte’s...

“G” is for grits. Grits is (or are) the coarse-to-fine ground product of a milling process whereby the hull of the dried corn kernel is popped open and the fleshy part is milled into tiny particles. Mill stones carved with grooves radiating outward from the center were set by the miller to grind the dried corn into coarse, medium, and fine grits as well as cornmeal. In modern times, grits are mass...

“C” is for Columbia College. Chartered in 1854 by the South Carolina Methodist Conference, Columbia College, was the eleventh-oldest women's college in the United States. In 1859 the institution opened in a new facility on Plain (Hampton) Street in Columbia. Closed after the Civil War, it reopened in 1873. In 1905 the college moved to a new campus in the Eau Claire neighborhood, north of the city....

“C” is for Columbia Canal. Completed in 1824, the Columbia canal originally extended three miles below the city of Columbia off Laurel St. It was one of several canals constructed by the state of South Carolina in the 1820s to improve transportation links between the upstate and Charleston. The construction of railroads ,however, supplanted the need for canals. While its usefulness as a transporta...

“C” is for Columbia Army Air Base. Columbia Army Air Base served as a training center for B-25 bomber crews during World War II. Selected in 1940 as one of 250 sites across the nation where federal funds would be used to construct an airfield, it was originally designated Lexington County Airport. After Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor, the U. S. Army Air Force took control. The declaration of war w...

“B” is for Boykin spaniel. The Boykin spaniel was originally bred in South Carolina before the 1920s. This amiable, small, dark brown retriever is a superb hunter and loving family pet. It was bred to provide an ideal dog for hunting fowl in the swamps along the Wateree River, which demanded a sturdy, compact dog built for boat travel and capable of retrieving on land or water. Lemuel Whittaker “W...

“B” is for Boyd, Blanche McCrary (b. 1945). Writer, educator. Born in Charleston, Boyd graduated from Pomona College and received her M. A. from Stanford University. She joined the faculty at Connecticut College in 1982. Boyd has published four novels: Nerves (1973), Mourning the Death of Magic (1977), Th e Revolution of Little Girls (1991), and Terminal Velocity (1997). The last two are part of a...

“S” is for South Carolina Commission on Government Restructuring. In March 1991 Governor Carroll Campbell appointed the thirty-eight member Commission on Government Restructuring to devise a blueprint for enhancing the powers of the state’s weak chief executive. The commission's report, issued in September 1991, called for a dramatic shift to a cabinet form of government similar to that used in fo...

“S” is for South Carolina Coastal Conservation League. Established in 1989, the South Carolina Coastal Conservation League has been a leading voice in the campaign to protect and preserve the coastal plain of the state. The grassroots, nonprofit organization has offices in Columbia, Beaufort, and Charleston. Its mission is to “protect the threatened resources of the coastal plain--its natural land...

“S” is for South Carolina Christian Action Council. The South Carolina Christian Action Council is a statewide ecumenical agency embracing many of the state's major Christian denominations. It provides educational programs for its constituents and a Christian witness in public affairs. Its origins can be traced to 1933 and the formation of the South Carolina Federated Forces for Temperance and Law...

“S” is for South Carolina Chamber of Commerce. The South Carolina Chamber of Commerce is an association organized mainly to promote and lobby the interests of business. The chamber was formed under the leadership of C. Norwood Hastie of Charleston in 1940. The chamber soon addressed issues of importance to the business community, such as reorganizing state government and urging the state to increa...

“P” is for Port Royal Experiment. The Port Royal Experiment, also called the Sea Island Experiment, was an early humanitarian effort to prepare the former enslaved persons of the South Carolina Sea Islands for inclusion as free citizens in American public life. The Port Royal Experiment was made possible by the U.S. Navy's conquest of the Sea Islands of Beaufort District in November 1861. Beaufort...

“G” is for Guignard Brick Works. James Sanders Guignard began making brick along the Congaree River near Columbia in 1803, under the name Guignard Brick Works.  During the Civil War, the plant fell into disuse. In 1886 Guignard’s great-grandson moved to the Columbia area to revive the brick operation. He mined clay extensively from alluvial deposits along the west bank of the Congaree River. In 19...

“G” Is for Guignard, Jane Bruce (1876-1963). Physician. Born in Aiken County, Guignard moved with her family to Columbia in 1895. With support from her family, she graduated from Women's Medical College in Philadelphia in 1904. After an internship, she returned to Colombia to practice medicine as one of the city's first female physicians. Obstetrics and pediatrics became the cornerstone of Guignar...

“S” is for South Carolina Budget and Control Board. South Carolina has historically been a “legislative” state with a tradition of a “commission” approach to government. Joining legislators with the executive branch decision-makers challenged the doctrine of separation of powers expressed in Article 1, Section 8 of the modern state constitution. Act 621, passed in 1948 created the State Budget and...

“S” is for South Carolina Baptist State Convention. The South Carolina Baptist State Convention became the first Baptist convention in the South when it was founded in 1821 at First Baptist Church in Columbia. The historical significance of the South Carolina Baptist State Convention in the formation of the Southern Baptist Convention and other state conventions should not be ignored. Major archit...

“S” is for South Carolina. Warship. During the Revolutionary War, patriot leaders of South Carolina worried about threats from the sea. Local officials dealt with this problem by creating a state navy--the most famous component of which was the frigate South Carolina , the largest warship under American command during the war. The state sent Commodore Alexander Gillon to Europe where in Amsterdam...

“M” is for Mount Dearborn Armory. Situated on an island in the Catawba River in Chester County, Mount Dearborn was initially conceived and selected by President George Washington to be one of the nation's three national arsenal-armories. In 1802 Secretary of War Henry Dearborn purchased 523 acres near the village of Rocky Mount. By early 1804 construction began on the magazine and arsenal, but the...

“G” is for Grimké, Sarah Moore (1792-1873), and Angelina Emily Grimké (1805-1879.) Abolitionists. Born into the upper echelon of antebellum Charleston society, the Grimké sisters first became involved in the public sphere through charity work in Charleston. Through their social work they began to challenge the contradictions between the teachings of Christian faith and the laws and practices of sl...

“C” is for Columbia, burning of (February 17-18, 1865). On the morning of February 17, 1865, when the mayor surrendered Columbia to General Sherman, the city was in chaos. Drunken mobs roamed the streets. Ragged cotton bales were everywhere. Driven by a strong wind, loose cotton covered the city like a snowstorm. Fires broke out in different sections of town. Driven by wooden buildings and burning...

“C” is for Columbia (Richland County: 2020 population 136,632). Named for Christopher Columbus and created in 1786 as the nation's first truly planned capital city, Columbia has a unique history that took shape in the wilderness near the geographic center of South Carolina. Since 1790 Columbia has continued to be a multifaceted community that defies easy classification. It is home to colleges but...

“R” is for Rutledge, John (ca.1739-1800). Lawyer, jurist, governor. A native Carolinian, Rutledge studied law at the Middle Temple in London. From 1761 to 1775, he was one of the leaders in the Commons House of Assembly. He represented his colony at the Stamp Act Congress and was a delegate to the First and Second Continental Congresses. When events made reconciliation with Great Britain impossibl...

“P” is for Port Royal, Battle of (November 7, 1861). The Battle of Port Royal culminated an amphibious operation designed to establish a United States military depot on the islands on the southeastern coast to carry out land and sea operations against the Confederacy. Fort Walker on Hilton Head and Fort Beauregard on Bay Point defended Port Royal Sound. After nearly five hours of fighting, the Con...

“M” is for Moultrie flag. In January 1776, the South Carolina Council of Safety sent Colonel William Moultrie, commander of the Second South Carolina Regiment at Fort Sullivan, twenty-three yards of blue cloth. In the colonel's memoirs he wrote: “it was thought necessary to have a flag for the purpose of signals: (there was no national or state flag at the time) I was desired by the council of saf...