Pat Conroy Remembered - Twice

Beaufort's most famous writer, Pat Conroy, is featured at the Books Sandwiched In Series on Monday, February 4, 2019 at Noon at the USC-B Center for the Performing Arts located at 805 Bay Street in Beaufort. Books Sandwiched In is the popular free series of book talks presented by the Friends of the Beaufort Library. This program features Jonathan Haupt and a panel of noted authors including Cassandra King Conroy, Sallie Ann Robinson and Bernie Schein who will discuss their memories of Conroy. 

Remembering Ann Head is set for March 27, 2019 at 5:30pm in the Beaufort Branch Meeting Room. Nancy Thode will discuss her mother's rather unconventional life and life choices, her impact on Conroy, her involvement in local political affairs, and her untimely death at age 52. Registration for this event co-sponsored by the Beaufort District Collection and the Pat Conroy Literary Center opened January 16th and will close when capacity is reached. http://bit.ly/2Ddyda6.

This Week in the BDC, 27 Jan 2019 - 2 Feb 2019 (and a few heads-up announcements)

Our Research Room is scheduled to be open our usual and customary hours of 9 AM to 5 PM this week. Drop by and talk with Kristy or Sam about your research needs. They will help you use our materials and services to answer your questions about all things Beaufort District. 

In addition to our usual Research Room services, we have two programs this week to interest our customers. One deals with language, origins of surnames and place names, and pronunciations unique to South Carolina . The other teaching research skills to folks interested in family history of ancestors who lived in this area during the Civil War and Reconstruction eras has been full for a week or more.

On Thursday Coastal Discovery Museum hosts BDC manager Grace Cordial who will discuss one of her favorite books Correct Mispronunciations of Some South Carolina Names by Claude and Irene Neuffer. Come learn why native South Carolinians say surnames and place names the way they do! The presentation concentrates on the people and places in Beaufort District's long and storied history.  Because this lecture is being held at Coastal Discovery Museum registration is required: https://www.coastaldiscovery.org/event-registration/?ee=12625 There is a fee. Registration will close when capacity is reached.

We tested the African-American genealogical workshop waters with a co-sponsored event back in October 2018. It was such a success that the International African-American Museum's Center for Family History, the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor Commission and the Beaufort County Library banned together to offer a class on Freedmen's Bureau Records. All seats at "Finding Your Ancestors in Freedmen's Bureau Records" on February 2, 2019 were reserved as of 15 January 2019 and the waiting list is beyond full too. Stay tuned for announcements of arrangements to do a second session in the Spring.

Be sure to read our online February Monthly calendar and events. You'll see a program about Native American garbage heaps and an outing to Palmetto Bluff Plantation for an illustrated talk about some of the many hurricanes that have affected Beaufort, Jasper, and Hampton counties through time.

Heads Up Alert:
Registration for "Remembering Ann Head: Beaufort's Forgotten Author & Mentor to Pat Conroy" has opened. I expect that seats for this March 27, 2019 event will go quickly. Sign up at http://bit.ly/2Ddyda6 sooner rather than later if you want - and can -- attend this free local literary history program brought to you by the BDC and our friends of the Pat Conroy Literary Center. Registration will close when capacity is reached.

Register for these Upcoming Programs Today!

For the most part, programs held inside library buildings are free of charge and often are "First come; First seated" programs. However, when library staff make presentations outside the library buildings or co-sponsors a community event, there may be advance registration and fees assessed by our co-sponsors. Sometimes programs inside our buildings require registration because we only have so many computers or so many seats and expect good turnouts. Thus, it can get somewhat confusing so here are the programs in January, February and one in March that require registration and/or payment of a fee to attend. Don't delay register today or risk all the seats being taken!   


Coming up on Thursday, January 31, 2019 - Lecture at Coastal Discovery Museum

Coosawhatchie. Pocataligo. Combahee. These words can be difficult for newcomers, or even old-timers, to pronounce. Join us to learn how to properly pronounce local family and place names the way native South Carolinians do while also picking up some local history tidbits. Beaufort District Collection manager, and South Carolina native, Grace Cordial will share fascinating stories of our local history, places, and families - and the correct way to mispronounce them!

Correct Mispronunciations of Some South Carolina Names with Grace Cordial
BDC@ Coastal Discovery Museum, 70 Honey Horn Drive, Hilton Head Island
January 31 at 3 pm. Cost is $7 per person and reservations are required by continuing online to https://www.coastaldiscovery.org/event-registration/?ee=12625 or by calling 843-689-6767 ext. 223.
The lecture will be closed when capacity is reached.


Coming up on Saturday, February 2, 2019  - FREE Family History Workshop at St. Helena Branch Library

PLEASE NOTE: Wait List started on 15 January 2019. We may be able to offer this workshop again. So please get your name on the Wait List.

We had such a great experience working with Toni Carrier of the International African American Museum and the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor Commission in October 2018 that we are jointly offering a follow-up genealogy workshop about how to use Freedmen's Bureau Records.

Family Search has posted most of these Federal records online. The Freedmen's Bureau records that Family Search has made into a digital collection consists of an index and images of records relating to census lists, arrival and departure registers, transportation records,  and some birth, death and burial records. Field Office records from the following states are represented: Alabama (M1900), District of Columbia (M1902), Georgia (M1903), Louisiana (M1905), Maryland and Delaware (M1906),Mississippi (M1907), North Carolina (M1909), South Carolina (M1910), Texas (M1912), Virginia (M1913). [The (M####) indicates that the records were taken from National Archives microfilm series]. 


The Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands (often called the Freedmen’s Bureau) was created in 1865 at the end of the American Civil War to supervise relief efforts including education, health care, food and clothing, refugee camps, legalization of marriages, employment, labor contracts, and securing back pay, bounty payments and pensions. The collection covers the years 1865 to 1872. As such, Freedmen’s Bureau records are a major source of genealogical information about post Civil War African Americans.

There are three ways to get on the wait list: Call 843- 818 - 4587; or register through the GGCHCC's Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/events/336240036925392 or send an e-mail to info@gullahgeecheecorridor.org.

 Coming up on Thursday, February 7, 2019 - Lecture at Tabernacle Baptist Church

The Beaufort County Historical Society and the Beaufort History Museum celebrate their 80th anniversaries with a special lecture sponsored by the BCHS, BHM, Tabernacle Baptist Church in cooperation with the Beaufort District Collection. The BDC's role is to share images of materials from our holdings about the history of those august institutions, these two lawyers, and the Reconstruction period during the celebratory reception.

Prof. W. Lewis Burke

William J. Whipper and Jonathan Jasper Wright: Beaufort's and South Carolina's First Civil Rights Lawyers presented by Distinguished Professor Emeritus W. Lewis Burke of the School of Law, University of South Carolina.
Thurs., February 7, 2019, 6:00 - 7:30 PM
BDC@ Tabernacle Baptist Church, 901 Craven Street, Beaufort
$ charged by partners
Details and registration: https://beauforthistorymuseum.wildapricot.org/event-3119022

Seats are limited.


The Beaufort District Collection is partnering with the Pat Conroy Literary Center to bring a very special world premiere program about Beaufort's Forgotten Author, Ann Head and her influence on Beaufort's best known author, Pat Conroy. The program is free though space is limited. Registration has opened: http://bit.ly/2Ddyda6

A word to the wise:

Don't delay registering if you're interested in the programs and workshops. Many of our program opportunities "sell out" in advance of the program date. 

"Red Saturday:" The Great Fire of 1907

(Beaufort District Collection)

January 19, 1907 was a very important date in the history of the City of Beaufort as a fire purportedly caused by three little boys naughtily smoking cigarettes behind F.W. Scheper's Barn on the corner of Bay and Carteret Streets ended up burning down a good portion of the town. 



The fire was noticed about 1:30pm on that Saturday and fanned by stiff winds from the southwest. Windblown embers ignited other structures spreading the fire rapidly and with catastrophic consequences. 

Ironically the Beaufort Gazette January 19, 1907 issue contained a front page notice about a small "Fire on the Bay" the previous day. That fire occurred at George Waterhouse's cotton gin and "was put out by the women operatives at once and little damage done."

Read more about "Red Saturday" in a series of posts to our BDCBCL Wordpress blog last January. https://bdcbcl.wordpress.com/2018/01/. If you'd like for the news to unfold now as it did 112 years ago: 

Savannah Morning News, January 20, 1907 https://bdcbcl.wordpress.com/2018/01/20/savannah-morning-news-coverage-january-20-1907-beaufort-fire/

Savannah Morning News, January 21, 1907 https://bdcbcl.wordpress.com/2018/01/21/savannah-morning-news-january-21-1907-coverage-of-the-beaufort-fire/ 

Savannah Morning News, January 22, 1907 https://bdcbcl.wordpress.com/2018/01/22/reports-about-the-beaufort-fire-on-january-22-1907/

Beaufort Gazette coverage of the catastrophic blaze begins on January 24, 1907 as it was only a weekly newspaper at the time. The issue had extensive coverage so the content is broken into a series of BDCBCL blog posts:  


* Beaufort Fire, Main Article
https://bdcbcl.wordpress.com/2018/01/24/beaufort-gazette-coverage-january-24-1907-beaufort-fire/


* "Fire Notes A" 
https://bdcbcl.wordpress.com/2018/01/27/beaufort-gazette-coverage-january-24-1907-beaufort-fire-fire-notes-a/

* "Mass Meeting" (Beaufortonians were incensed about what the Savannah Morning News had written)
https://bdcbcl.wordpress.com/2018/01/31/beaufort-gazette-coverage-january-24-1907-beaufort-fire-mass-meeting/

* "Fire Notes B" mention the specific circumstances of some of the townspeople 

https://bdcbcl.wordpress.com/2018/02/02/beaufort-gazette-coverage-january-24-1907-beaufort-fire-fire-notes-b/ 

* "Death of William Bennett" was the most unfortunate consequences of the blaze https://bdcbcl.wordpress.com/2018/02/07/beaufort-gazette-coverage-january-24-1907-beaufort-fire-death-of-william-bennett/

Reminder: The Library system will be closed Monday, January 21, 2019 in observance of Martin Luther King, Jr. day. Regular hours resume Tuesday, January 22, 2019.

Registration Now Open: Remembering Ann Head

The Beaufort District Collection is doing its first cooperative program with the Pat Conroy Literary Center on March 27, 2019. Registration is now open and because seats are limited, readers of this blog are getting the news second. (I put the notice on our Facebook page first. You might want to start following our Facebook page. The address is https://www.facebook.com/BDC.BCL/ )

Writer Ann Head was Pat Conroy's first creative writing teacher at Beaufort High School and oh my, the impact she made on him! Learn about Head's unconventional life and how she affected Conroy through personal mementos, unpublished letters, literary excerpts and family stories shared by her daughter, Nancy Thode. 

Both writers found a muse in their adopted hometown of Beaufort, and here in lowcountry, Ann Head's story will finally be told.
 
Space is limited. Don't delay, register today before all the seats get taken: http://bit.ly/2Ddyda6

BDC Reaches Out with Program and Events

We are getting off to a slower start than usual in 2019. Not to worry, though, because we have 3 community outreach events and 2 library based programs between January 31 and February 28 for you to attend. Some are free while some require advance registration and payment of a fee to our partners. We cover onomatology, African American history, genealogy, archaeology and lots of disasters in these offerings:

Correct Mispronunciations of Some South Carolina Names with Grace Cordial | Thurs., January 31, 2019 | BDC@ Coastal Discovery Museum, 70 Honey Horn Drive, Hilton Head Island | 3 PM | $ Registration and fee required by CDM https://www.coastaldiscovery.org/event-registration/?ee=12625 The session will be closed when capacity is reached.

Freedmen's Bureau Records with Toni Carrier, Executive Director, Center for Family History, International African American Museum | Sat., February 2, 2019 | BDC@ St. Helena Branch Library, 6355 Jonathan Francis Senior Road | 1 PM - 3 PM. To register for the workshop: https://www.gullahgeecheecorridor.org/calendar/ or telephone: (843) 818-4587 email: info@gullahgeecheecorridor.org


In 2019, BCHS and BHM are celebrating 80 years of preserving history in Beaufort County. The lecture will be held in the Tabernacle Baptist Church with a reception and book sale in the Tabernacle Baptist Church Fellowship Hall. The Beaufort District Collection will project a slideshow of items from its holdings about William J Whipper, Jonathan Jasper Wright, the Beaufort County Historical Society and the Beaufort Museum during the reception. 

Professor Burke

 
W. J. Whipper and J. J. Wright: Beaufort's and South Carolina's First Civil Rights Lawyers presented by Prof. W. Lewis Burke in cooperation with the Beaufort County Historical Society, Beaufort History Museum & Tabernacle Baptist Church | Thurs., February 7, 2019 | BDC@ Tabernacle Baptist Church, 901 Craven Street, Beaufort | 6:00 - 7:30 PM | $ Registration is required: https://beauforthistorymuseum.wildapricot.org/event-3119022



Shell Middens of the Lowcountry with Jeff Sherard, Archaeologist, Brockington & Associates | Wed., February 20, 2019 | BDC@ Beaufort Branch Library, First Floor, 311 Scott Street | 2 PM
First come; first seated; No registration

Hurricanes in Beaufort District's Past with Grace Cordial | Wed., February 27, 2019 | BDC@ Palmetto Bluff Conservancy Classroom, 659 Old Moreland Road, Bluffton | Noon to 1 PM
Free and open to the general public

The Library system will be closed on Monday, January 21, 2019 to observe Martin Luther King, Jr. day. Regular hours will resume on Tuesday, January 22, 2019.

New (and New to Us) Materials, Mid-November through New Year's Eve 2018

The Beaufort District Collection is always growing by purchase or gift. New and new to us materials arriving to our shelves between mid-November and the end of 2018 were:


Through My Eyes by Carolyne Taylor Wynne (2017) provides a  personal account of her transformation from a rural farm girl born near Ridgeland to corporate accountant based in Atlanta into world traveler. (Purchase)

Gullah Woodburning Folk Art by Rev. Johnnie F. Simmons [2018], a delightfully colorful little book (literally little, the book measures 5 inches by 4 inches) of his woodburned depictions of Gullah culture and life on St. Helena Island was donated by the artist. (Gift)

A History of South Carolina Lighthouses by John Hairr (2014) includes three sections relevant to lighthouses in Beaufort District on Hunting, Hilton Head, and Daufuskie Islands. He also puts "paid" to some folk history regarding the Charleston lighthouse. Come read the corrected history yourself in our Research Room - or borrow a copy from one of the SCLENDS libraries.  (He spells his surname with a double "r" so that's not a typographical error.) (Purchase)

You Were Born One Time by Quitman Marshall (2014) won the South Carolina Poetry Archives book prize when it was published. Marshall moved to Beaufort more than 15 years ago. The Island Packet wrote an article about his career and his award winning book of poetry.
His poem "Mud" begins:

The blue pluff mud of low tide
ought to tell those who have the view
of and damn well paid for it
that their grip on anything is weak...

Masterful use of a small number of words to convey philosophical concept, don't you think?  (Gift)

The Mermaid of Hilton Head Written and illustrated by Nina Leipold (2016) helps children understand how cutting off lights helps saves sea turtles and protects the natural environment.(Purchase)

Yamasee Indians from Florida to South Carolina edited and with an introduction by Denise I. Bossy (2018) "brings together archaeologists of South Carolina and Florida with historians of the Native South, Spanish Florida, and British Carolina for the the first time to answer elusive questions about the Yamasees' identity, history, and fate." (Quote is from the book's dust cover) Additional copies to check out are available in Beaufort and Bluffton Branch local history sections. (Purchase)

Cultural Resources Survey of the Bull Hill Tract, Beaufort County, South Carolina by Brockington and Associates for the Del Webb Corporation (1994) was conducted in order for the developer to comply with existing state and Federal regulations before construction of Sun City Hilton Head could begin. The conclusion of the study was "Proposed development activities will result in no adverse effects to any significant cultural resources. Any ground disturbing activities at these sites or in the Bull Hill Tract should be allowed to proceed without further management considerations."(p. ii)  (Gift)

The Structural Integrity of the Habersham House prepared by Joel P. Porcher, Jr., and William E. Rettew for Colin Brooker (1985) is an engineering assessment of the condition of one of Beaufort's most historic structures. The building was reinforced and remains in use as Saltus River Grill in 2018. (Gift)

Rice: Global Networks and New Histories  edited by Francesca Bray, Peter A. Coclanis, Edda L. Fields-Black and Dagmar Schafer (2015). Although rice feeds about half of the people on earth, heretofore little attention has been paid to the history of the product and how it helped capitalism and colonialism flourish across the globe and centuries. 15 articles discuss rice culture and history in Africa, Asia, South Carolina, and Arkansas. (Purchase)

Embattled Freedom: Journeys through the Civil War's Slave Refugee Camps by Amy Murrell Taylor,  (2018)  In addition to the local enslaved people who suddenly found themselves within Union lines in late 1861, many thousands of enslaved people made their way to Federal camps in search of freedom throughout the Civil War. Though Taylor thoroughly examines life in the Hampton, Virginia, Helena, Arkansas, and Camp Nelson, Kentucky camps, she refers to Mitchelville on Hilton Head Island only a few times. Nevertheless, a researcher should understand the general outlines of how the slave refugee camps worked in other locations as s/he undertakes learning more about Mitchelville, the first freedmen's village. Reviews of this book are found on the websites of Publisher's Weekly and the Civil War Books and Authors Booknotes pages.


The Beaufort Sail and Power Squadron  and the Clover Club made additional deposits to their archives and we got a host of posters from Beaufort Branch to process for our ever growing collection of posters to community events.

Friends Groups Offer Book Talks Early in 2019

The Friends of the Beaufort Library 2019 Books Sandwiched In series begins January 7, 2019. Sessions are held in the USC Center for the Arts auditorium at 805 Carteret Street, Beaufort. Although only one book "qualifies" as a local history title, i.e. Our Prince of Scribes, the list includes some interesting titles. You'll also notice that three include presentations by the author: The New Grand Strategy by and presented to the group by author Mark Mykleby; Jonathan Haupt was an editor of Our Prince of Scribes, and he is on the panel presenting the book; and novelist John Warley shares his Bethesda's Child. (Our regular readers know that the BDC concentrates on works of non-fiction so we don't classify novels as part of our responsibilities.)

The Friends of the Hilton Head Library begin their Book Break series mid-January. The sessions are held on Wednesdays at Noon in the Hilton Head Library's Community Room. Refreshments provided by the Friends precede the program of the day.

Several of these scheduled talks have likely local history components: David Lauderdale; Beholding Nature, and Before the Bridge. 

January 16 - David Lauderdale, presenter
January 23 - Driving Miss Norma, presented by Janet Porter
January 30 - Sandcastle Girls, presented by Nevart Asadoorian
February 6 - Black Blue Bloods, presented by Neil Andrew
February 13 - The Shirt on His Back, presented by Dr. Virginia McKenzie
February 20 - Beholding Nature, presented by the author and photographer, Eric Horan
February 27 - Before the Bridge, presented by Collins Doughtie
March 6 - Sea Change: A Message of the Oceans presented by Michell Meissen
    
For additional details please read the Friends of the Hilton Head Island Library Winter Newsletter online. The schedule and blurbs are on page 3.

Make plans now to attend one, some or all of the book reviews to support the Friends who support us!

The Library system closes at 5 pm on Monday, December 31 and will remain closed on New Year's Day. Regular hours will resume Wednesday, January 2, 2019. Happy New Year to all!