As per usual, some minor editing has occurred. - gmc
July1 - The monthly overview on the BDC's Facebook page is an abbreviated and edited version of the monthly overivew post on Connections.
July 7 - AM -"Uniquely BDC Materials Monday:" I talked a bit about Lafayette's incarceration during the French Revolution last week in "Red, White, and Blue (times 2)." If you'd like to learn more, we are the only SCLENDS library to hold Lafayette: Prisoner of State by Paul S. Spalding (2010) about the 5 years (1792 - 1797) he spent in lock-up by a coalition of Austrians and Prussians during the French Revolution. According to the author: "Fayettists saw his experience as a parable of the struggle that would eventually lead to the triumph of liberty over tyranny, good over evil." Be sure not to jump over the bits about South Carolinians Francis Kinloch Huger and Thomas Pinckney and the 1794 escape attempt.
July 7 - PM - A few snaps from the first sneak peek of "Da Gullah American Revolutionary Experience expo" on July 2nd. We do so hope to see some of you South of the Broad River folks at Christ Lutheran Church on Hilton Head for the second and final sneak peek on Wednesday.
July 8 - Sydney and Cassi have caught up on all the "New (and New to us) Materials" that have arrived in the BDC between April 1 and June 30. Enjoy! Expect the next update by mid-October.
July 9 - AM - "Black History Note:" Today's your last chance for a sneak peek of "Da Gullah American Revolutionary Experience" ...
July 10 - Sydney highlights some of the "colorful" items on our walls.
July 11 - Another entry in our occasional "Finding Aid Friday" series: An independent historian's research into "The Castle," one of Beaufort District's most interesting historic houses. We also posted photos from our Outreach events at Da Gullah American Revolutionary War sneak peek presentations.
July 13 - Though we have nothing "special" scheduled this week, the BDC's fiscal year 2026 local history programs began on July 2nd with my program about the true-blue friendship of James Monroe and the Marquis de Lafayette. July 28th Cassi will do "Moo-fort"; on Sunday, [yes, a Sunday] August 3rd, the BDC is co-sponsoring a Panel Discussion about plans for a digital history of Fort Fremont with West Point cadets; Ted Panayotoff will help us celebrate National Lighthouse Day; and I'm doing two sessions about the Hurricane of 1893 - all before the end of August hitting 4 of the library's 6 physical branch libraries and 3 off-site locations. The BDC is most definitely on the road again.
July 14 - "Uniquely BDC: Materials Monday:" I'm sure that you're quite acquainted with today's featured image "Emancipation Day in South Carolina -- The Color-Sergeant of the 1st South Carolina (colored) Volunteers Addressing the Regiment; after having been presented with the stars and stripes at Smith's Plantation, Port Royal Island, January 1" published in Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper on January 24, 1863. Nevertheless, the BDC is the only library within the SCLENDS consortium to have an original copy of page 276 listed in the catalog. It is SC PRINT #160 in our holdings.
In this case, the "color" in honor of the 2025 Summer Reading Program theme refers to the United States flag.
Colonel T.W. Higginson was presented with the colors during the Emancipation Day ceremony at Camp Saxton. In his diary entry for January 1, 1863 he writes "I spoke, receiving the flags & then gave them into the hands of two noble looking black men, as color-guard, & they also spoke, very effectively, Prince Rivers & Robert Sutton." We have a copy of The Complete Civil War Journal and Selected Letters of Thomas Wentworth Higginson edited by Christopher Looby (2000) in the Research Room is you'd like to read more about Higginson's comments on the day's festivities.
July 15 - Lots of folks enjoy looking at coffee-table books. We have some suggestions for you about local history related ones in Connections.
July 16 - 7 PM - In honor of National Snake Day, I thought that I'd share this wonderful image by Julian Dimock of Dr. Francis E. Wilder (1837-1924) holding a rattlesnake. If you check out a copy of Camera Man's Journey from one of the Library system's local history sections, you can see him defang said rattlesnake. There are plenty of copies of this book of turn-of-the-20th century photographs taken in Beaufort, Hilton Head and Columbia to borrow from the Library.
July 17 - Learn how a teenager helped color the world with blue, indigo blue.
July 20 - Cue the theme from Jaws [John Williams' great soundtrack is on Hoopla] - and read these books about our local sharks to celebrate(?) Shark Week 2025!! You can also make plans to attend the Fort Fremont Digital history project panel discussion in two weeks.
July 21 - "Uniquely BDC: Materials Monday" that "Colors Our World" with History: Indigo in America is a short booklet that published by the Charles Towne Landing Foundation in 1998. Though short, it offers substantial information on the history of indigo, its cultivation process, and its overall impact on the world. Although this title focuses on indigo in America, it is important to remember that its earliest usage dates back thousands of years ago to India; and though indigo was grown and processed in America, much of the final product was exported to England. The BDC is the only SCLENDS library to have a copy of this booklet.
July 23 - "Black History Note" in SRP 2025 "Color Our World": Peter H. Wood wrote a groundbreaking thesis in 1972 that was turned into a monograph in 1975 entitled Black Majority: Negroes in Colonial South Carolina from 1670 through the Stono Rebellion. It has remained in print ever since. Wood explored the consequences of importing the largest single group of non-English-speaking migrants to the North American colonies on United States history through a thorough and penetrating case study of the Palmetto State during the period. He ends it with the Stono Rebellion of 1739 and its aftermath. The BDC has a copy but there are also plenty of copies that you can check out through the SCLENDS consortium.
July 24 - 10 AM - Having a dedicated Library Specialist means that Cassandra investigated "arsenic green" as a BDC contribution to the Library system's "Color Our World" Summer Reading Program - and as you will read, it turned out to be an eye-opening investigation with implications to the every day operations of the BDC going forward. Enjoy - but be sure to wash your hands afterwards!
July 24 - 7 PM - 2 weeks to the Author Book Talk with Ted Panayotoff!
July 25 - Today's "Finding Aid Friday" is in honor of our next local history program. Some of the "Cows on Vacation" images will be featured in Cassi's presentation about the colorful local public art projects of the past 20 or so years.
July 26 - Pictorial Works can "Color Our World" with history. As a cultural heritage organization, the BDC is in it for the long haul - and school annuals and church directories are part of our strategy to support present and future researchers.
July 27 - This Week in the BDC: Cassandra presents "Moo-fort, Mermaids, and More" a look back at the public arts projects here in the past 25 years on Monday evening. The end of Summer Reading happens on Thursday. Be sure to finalize your reading and get your gameboards turned in as directed.
[The presentation grew from a Connections post I assigned her to write about the colorful art projects.]
July 28 - [Uniquely BDC series] Though most folks probably don't think much about this, cultural heritage organizations such as the BDC have to gather some highly selective materials each year about community "stuff" going on at the time. As you will learn in more detail, the BDC has collected information, posters, photographs, etc. about some of the local public art projects of the 21st century that Cassandra will highlight in her program this evening as our 2nd local history program to "Color Our World." It's rather mind-boggling how fast sources about popular projects at the time get lost and removed from media platforms.
July 29 - White Servitude in Colonial South Carolina by Warren B. Smith (USC Press, 1960) examines a significant portion of the colony's overall population and a powerful element in the settlement of the province between 1730 and 1765. Most of the white servants covered in this book had bound themselves for periods of 2 to 4 years to cover the cost of the sea voyage across the Atlantic Ocean. A few were criminals who were to serve their prison terms working in the colony. Some were political prisoners from Scotland. The appendices are important for understanding the law and impact of white servitude in South Carolina: Appendix I is "An Act for the Better Governing and Regulating White Servants" (1717); Appendix II is "An Act for the Better Governing and Regulating White Servants, and to Repeal" Act of 1717; Appendix III covers "Statistics on Population, Importation of Nego Slaves and Exportation of Rice;" and Appendix IV is a "Complete List of White Servants Appearing as Items in the Wills and Inventories Recorded in Probate Court of Charleston County".
Another potential source for the identification of indentured (white) servants is First Settlers of South Carolina, 1670-1700 by Agnes Leland Baldwin (1985).
Both books are available in the BDC Research Room: bdc@bcgov.net; 843-255-6468.
July 30 - "Black History Note:" Ben Tillman & The Reconstruction of White Supremacy by Stephen Kantrowitz (2000) discusses the roll-back of Reconstruction Era civil rights for African-Americans that had a profound and lasting effect on the course of history in the Palmetto State thereafter. This book traces the history of white male supremacy and its discontents from the era of plantation slavery to the age of Jim Crow. Friend and foe alike and generations of historians interpreted Tillman's physical and rhetorical violence in defense of white supremacy as a matter of racial and gender instinct but the author says that there is more to the story. He reveals how Tillman's white supremacy was a political program and social argument whose legacies continue to shape American life.
July 31 - [Red Letter Local History Day] Serious talk of separating the Southern states from the Federal government began years before the actual break. Reiterating thoughts first introduced to his constituents from the Walterboro courthouse steps in June 1828, impassioned Robert Barnwell Rhett found a receptive audience at a homecoming dinner held in his honor at Bluffton on July 31, 1844. It is said that 500 people showed up to hear his speech under an oak tree about limiting Federal powers: "If you value your rights you must resist." Others, called Fire-Eaters, echoed the call in the coming years. Many see this speech as the start of the "Bluffton Movement," a critical point towards the secession of the Southern states in 1860 - 1861.
PS: I included a reminder about the end of Summer Reading 2025.
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