South Carolina from A to Z

“H” is for Hoppin' John. Hoppin' John is a pilaf made with beans and rice. The recipe came directly to America from West Africa and is typical of the one-pot cooking of the South Carolina lowcountry. As the recipe moved inland, it became the traditional dish for good luck on New Year's Day throughout the American South. The origins of the dish and its ingredients are unknown. Whatever its origins,...

“G” is for Greenville County Museum of Art. Located on Heritage Green in downtown Greenville, the Greenville County Museum of Art (GCMA) collects and exhibits American art. In 1963 the South Carolina General Assembly established the Greenville County Museum Commission. In 1974 GCMA moved into its modernist building accommodating almost 90,000 square feet for spacious exhibition galleries, a museum...

“G” is for Greenville County (790 square miles; 2020 population 532,486). Greenville County was created in 1786 out of Cherokee land. Originally part of Ninety Six District, the county consisted of the land between the Saluda River and the Indian boundary line of 1767. After the Revolutionary War settlers moved into the area--most numerous were veterans who applied for state bounty lands. The ante...

“D” is for Dueling. Duels took place in South Carolina from colonial times until 1880, when the General Assembly officially outlawed the practice. The practice of dueling reached its peak between 1818 and 1860. Though it occurred throughout the English colonies and the United States, the practice was concentrated in the South, and South Carolina was the site of a disproportionate number of duels....

“C” is for Citadel, The. The Citadel originated in 1822 as an arsenal and guard house. In 1842 the General Assembly created the South Carolina Military Academy. Like other southern states, South Carolina believed military education would instill education, discipline, character, and patriotic devotion in its young men. During the Civil War Citadel cadets helped shore up defenses around Charleston...

“C” is for Circular Congregational Church (Charleston). Circular Congregational Church, dedicated in 1892, is the fourth house of worship on this site at 150 Meeting Street. Its Richardsonian Romanesque style reflects Charleston's tradition of adopting current architectural fashion for ecclesiastical buildings, despite the city's famous conservatism in residential design. The Dissenters Society, o...

“C “is for Church of the Nativity (Union). Located in Union, the Church of the Nativity (consecrated in 1859) is a remarkably effective example of the Ecclesiological architectural style favored by the Episcopal Church in America and the Anglican Communion throughout the world in the 1840s and 1850s. Ecclesiologists, strongly influenced by the Oxford movement with its emphasis on sacrament and mys...

“C” is for Church of the Cross (Bluffton). Sited on a wooded bluff above a curve in the May River, the Church of the Cross is a beautiful and serene lowcountry chapel. The handsome cruciform Gothic building was consecrated in 1857. It was built of cypress with a shingled cypress roof. Entered through an arched door under a trefoil window and flanking shuttered lancet windows, it opened to an inter...

“C” is for Civilian Conservation Corps. The CCC was a New Deal federal initiative. In South Carolina the CCC worked with state and federal agencies, especially the National Park Service and the US Forest Service, to develop seventeen state parks, several fish hatcheries, and National Forest recreation areas. The CCC's most important legacy was the role it played in the transformation of South Caro...

“C” is for Christian Methodist Episcopal Church. One of the seven largest African American denominations, the CME church was originally titled the Colored Methodist Episcopal Church. Organized in 1870 it amicably emerged from the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. In 1954 the church title was changed from “Colored” to “Christian.” The smallest of the three Black Methodist groups, the CME has close...

“B” is for Blue Ridge Railroad. Chartered in 1852, the Blue Ridge Railroad revived earlier plans to connect Charleston to the Midwest by rail. Built by Irish and German immigrants and local enslaved persons, the Blue Ridge Railroad was intended to return Charleston to commercial prominence in the American South. Funding was problematic, and only a massive infusion of state funds kept the railroad...

“B” is for Blue Ridge. The Blue Ridge in South Carolina forms the smallest of the geological provinces. There are commonly two understandings of the Blue Ridge. The first is the geologic Blue Ridge (found only in Oconee County). The second is the geographic Blue Ridge, which includes both the Blue Ridge Mountains and inner Piedmont mountains such as Sassafras, Pinnacle, and Table Rock. This area,...

“B” is for Blue granite. State stone. Blue granite was designated the state stone by law in 1969.  The state is famed for Winnsboro blue granite, which was quarried for many years in Fairfield County. The stone is of light blue color and contains particles of mica, feldspar, and quartz. It is much prized in construction and decoration. The Winnsboro Granite Company quarried and shipped the “beauti...

“H” is for Honey Hill, Battle of (November 30, 1864). The Battle of Honey Hill was the first in a series of engagements fought at the headwaters of the Broad rRver along the Charleston and Savannah Railroad in November and December 1864. On November 29, 1864, a six-thousand-man division of United States Army troops was transported up the Broad River and disembarked at Boyd's landing for an attack...

“G” is for Greenville and Columbia Railroad. The Greenville and Columbia Railroad was the first railroad to enter the South Carolina upcountry. When the road was completed in 1853, the160-mile route included spurs to Anderson and Abbeville. The success of those spurs inspired the creation of other short routes that extended the reach of the Greenville and Columbia in the upstate. By 1859 spurs con...

"D” is for DuBose, William Porcher (1836-1918). Professor, theologian. Dubose was born near Winnsboro and studied for the ordained ministry in the Episcopal Church. As a deacon, he served as chaplain to Confederate soldiers. He was ordained a priest in 1866 and served as rector of Trinity Church, Abbeville. From 1871 to 1883 he was chaplain at the University of the South at Sewanee, Tennessee wher...

“D” is for Drovers. From the late1790s until the 1880s, livestock from Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia, and North Carolina were driven through Greenville County to the seaport of Charleston, destined for northern markets in Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York or south to Florida and the West Indies. These drives were made possible by the completion of a road from Greenville County across the mounta...

“C” is for Christensen, Abby Mandana Holmes (1852-1938).  Folklorist. Born in Westborough, Massachusetts in 1852, Christiansen moved to South Carolina with her abolitionist family in 1864. A pioneer in the field of African American folklore, she published her first story, “De Wolf, De Rabbit an’ de Tar Baby.” Her career as a collector of Gullah folklore culminated in her book Afro American Folklor...

“C” is for Christ Church Parish. Located on the low, sandy strip of land southeast of the Wando River in modern Charleston County, Christ Church was one of the ten original parishes created by the Church Act of 1706. With the introduction of rice as a staple crop in the early eighteenth century, Christ Church quickly became a parish of planters and enslaved persons. By 1720 enslaved Africans made-...

“C” is for Citizens’ Councils. Founded in 1954 in Mississippi, citizens councils quickly spread across the South. The organizations promoted membership as a respectable way for disgruntled segregationists to protest civil rights activism. They publicly renounced violence but encouraged organized economic pressure against African Americans and Whites who were sympathetic to the Black freedom strugg...

“C” is for Childress, Alice (1920-1994 ). Actress, theater director, playwright, novelist. Childress was born in Charleston but was taken to New York City quite early and raised by her grandmother. However, she maintained a connection to the lowcountry through a network of Charlestonians living in Harlem. She first worked professionally as an actress in 1940, when she joined the American Negro the...

“P" is for Pisé de Terre. Pisé de Terre or rammed earth, is an ancient form of building construction. Clay is the basic material in rammed earth buildings. After a foundation of brick or stone is laid, clay is poured into wooden molds and then tamped until solid. Additional layers are added until the walls reached the desired height, and the finished walls are coated with stucco. In 1821 Dr. Willi...

“M” is for Molloy, Robert (1906-1977). Novelist, editor, critic. Born in Charleston, at age twelve Molloy moved with his family to Philadelphia and then New York City. By 1936 he was working as a book reviewer and copy editor for the New York Sun and was later its literary editor. He wrote short stories that were published in national magazines and then a friend suggested he try novel writing. His...

“P” is for Piracy. Charleston was the chief port of Carolina, a region contested by the Spanish, French, and English in the frequent wars of the era. The proprietary government was often weak and sometimes corrupt. Pirates thrived in such an uncertain and turbulent setting. Charleston’s bustling trade also attracted raids by foreign privateers. Among the most notorious of the pirates sailing off S...

“M” is for Milliken, Roger (1915-2010). Businessman, political activist. Born in New York Milliken graduated from Yale and joined the textile firm his grandfather had founded--Deering Milliken company. In 1947 he moved to Spartanburg and also started to concentrate the company's operations in the South Carolina Piedmont. He turned Deering Milliken into one of the biggest and most successful textil...