The South Carolina Historical Marker Program, established in 1936, has approved the installation of more than 1,700 interpretive plaques, each highlighting how places both grand and unassuming have played important roles in the history of the Palmetto State. These roadside markers identify and interpret places valuable for understanding South Carolina's past, including sites of consequential events and buildings, structures, or other resources significant for their design or their association with institutions or individuals prominent in local, state, or national history. This volume includes a concise history of the South Carolina Historical Marker Program and an overview of the marker application process. For those interested in specific historic periods or themes, the volume features condensed lists of markers associated with broader topics such as the American Revolution, African American history, women's history, the Civil War, and Reconstruction. While the program is administered by the South Carolina Department of Archives and History, most markers are proposed by local organizations that serve as a marker's official sponsor, paying its cost and assuming responsibility for its upkeep. In that sense, this inventory is a record not just of places and subjects that the state has deemed worthy of acknowledgment, but of those that South Carolinians themselves have worked to enshrine.

This book was written to aid families with ancestors from Laurens County, South Carolina, to jumpstart their genealogical research. Although the focus is on sources of particular relevance to African Americans, the book also contains information relevant to slave-holding families. Also, the background information at the beginning of each section will be of general interest to those families from South Carolina who are researching their African ancestors. In addition to practical advice born from the authors genealogical research and formal studies, the book includes information and compilations regarding the following topics: Free Persons of Color in Antebellum Laurens Slaves in Will Transcripts (17821860) Legislative Papers (17821866) Comptroller General Tax Return Books (18661868) 1869 SC State Population Census 1860 US Census Slave Schedule and Matching African American Surnames in the 1870 US Census Excerpts of Freedmen Bureau Records Grave Markers at Five African American Churches

John McFall was born in 1878-the year after the disputed South Carolina gubernatorial election that marked the end of Reconstruction in South Carolina. He died in 1954-two months after the Supreme Court's landmark Brown v. Board of Education school desegregation case handed down on May 17, 1954. This volume contains Dr. McFall's complete and never before published manuscript, in which he eloquently reports on events between those milestones.

The South Caroliniana Library, located on the historic Horseshoe of the University of South Carolina campus in Columbia, is one of the premier research archives and special collections repositories in South Carolina and the American Southeast. The library's holdings—manuscripts, published materials, university archives, and visual materials—are essential to understanding the Palmetto State and Southern culture as it has evolved over the past 300 years. When opened as the South Carolina College library in 1840 it was the first freestanding academic library building in the United States. Designed by Robert Mills, architect of the Washington Monument, it is built in the Greek Revival style and features a replica of the reading room that once housed Thomas Jefferson's personal library in the second Library of Congress. When the college built a larger main library (now known as the McKissick Museum) in 1940, the Mills building became the home of "Caroliniana"—published and unpublished materials relating to the history, literature, and culture of South Carolina. Through a dedicated mining of the resources this library has held, art historian John M. Bryan crafted this comprehensive narrative history of the building's design, construction, and renovations, which he enhanced with personal entries from the diaries and letters of the students, professors, librarians, and politicians who crossed its threshold. A treasure trove of Caroliniana itself, this colorful volume, featuring 95 photographs and illustrations, celebrates a beautiful and historic structure, as well as the rich and vibrant history of the Palmetto State and the dedicated citizenry who have worked so hard to preserve it. A foreword is provided by W. Eric Emerson, director, South Carolina Department of History and Archives.