Author Book Talk: Phosphate Mining

You are in for quite a treat!  Cultural heritage organizations like to band together to bring extra special series, events, or presentations to you, our community.  We try to maximize our funds and reach by collaborating well and as often as possible. The Library is delighted to have the Beaufort County Historical Society and the Coastal Discovery Museum as co-sponsors for Dr. McKinley's lectures on the little known, but very historically significant, local phosphate mining industry.

McKinley will expose the heretofore invisible black laborers who moved fluidly between factory, mining, agriculture, fishing, and hunting to scratch out a living for their families and maintain a quality of life that was an expression of the high value the recently emancipated enslaved placed on family, education and autonomy. Come hear why McKinley sees southern industrialization as a "distinctly southern process, led initially by the planter elite and strongly influenced by the black labor force" more accustomed to working within the confines of the task system than a timeclock. 

Attend one of the sessions on Thurs., May 15, 2014 to learn more about this industry that helped transform the South. The lectures are free and open to the general public. 

• BDC@ St. Helena Branch Library,  6355 Jonathan Francis Sr Road at Noon with co-sponsor Beaufort County Historical Society.  The Beaufort County Historical Society offers an optional lunch meal for a fee. An optional lunch is available for a fee from the Beaufort County Historical Society.  Please make reservations for lunch by calling 843.524.3942 or by e-mailing Hoffmaks@earthlink.net by Monday, May 12th.  

• BDC@ Coastal Discovery Museum,  Honey Horn Plantation, Hilton Head Island  at 3 pm.  Space is limited.  Please reserve your seat by calling 843-689-6767 ext 223.

Phosphate Industry on May 15th

Cultural heritage organizations like to band together to bring extra special series, events, or presentations to you, our community.  These special offerings are planned months, sometimes even years in advance. We try to maximize our funds and reach by collaborating well and as often as possible.  Such an offering is coming to Beaufort County on Thursday, May 15th so please mark your calendars accordingly.

On Thurs., May 15th, the Beaufort District Collection, the Beaufort County Historical Society, and the Coastal Discovery Museum are co-sponsoring free lectures by Dr. Shepherd McKinley about his book, Stinking Stones and Rocks of Gold: Phosphate, Fertilizer, and Industrialization in Postbellum South Carolina, University Press of Florida, released yesterday! The lecture North of the Broad River will be held at the St. Helena Branch Library at Noon followed a reprise of the lecture at the Coastal Discovery Museum beginning at 3 pm. Make plans now to attend one of the sessions about the most important of Beaufort District's past industries.

 

Coastal Heritage Magazine: Oysters

"Lowcountry Living Shorelines: Restoring Carolina's Reefs," is the topic of the current issue of Coastal Heritage Magazine.  The magazine is available in print in the BDC Research Room.  For your convenience, the Sea Grant Consortium posts Coastal Heritage Magazine online at http://www.scseagrant.org/Content/?cid=626.


Public libraries have a broad range of customers.  Some customers prefer juicy tidbits of visual information.  If you are one of these customers, view the "Beaufort County History Moments "Oysters" segment hosted by Natalie Hefter. (She spends a lot of her time at Coastal Discovery Museum dealing with school groups.  Accordingly, she delivers the crucial information that one needs to have quickly. Beaufort County History Moments are a collaboration of the County Channel,  Beaufort County Planning Department, Beaufort County Library and the Coastal Discovery Museum).

For our customers who prefer to indulge their curiosity more deeply, some of the suggested reading materials that end the largest article actually can be accessed online, read in the BDC, found within our subscription databases, or borrowed through our circulating collections.

The "Shellfish Reefs at Risk: A Global Analysis of Problems and Solutions" report (2009) is available for download through the Nature Conservancy website using this URL: conserveonline.org/library/shellfish-reefs-at-risk-report/@@view.html  An update is found at http://www.nature.org/ourinitiatives/habitats/oceanscoasts/explore/shellfish-reefs-at-risk.xml.

The Oyster by William K. Brooks published by Johns Hopkins University Press in 1996 is actually a republication of the original book published in 1905. The 1905 edition is available from Google books.  URL: http://books.google.com/books?id=yCOUY6ww6PMC&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false

The South Carolina Digital Library has Burrell's South Carolina Oyster Industry: A History online at digital.tcl.sc.edu/cdm/compoundobject/collection/oyster/id/122.  We have print copies in the BDC under call # SC 664.94 BUR.

Ernest Ingersoll's The Oyster-Industry, 1881 is available online at archive.org/details/oysterindustry00inge.

Jeremy B.C. Jackson and others, co-authored  "Historical overfishing and the recent collapse of coastal ecosystems" in Science magazine, vol. 293, no. 5530 (2001).  The article is available through our subscription EBSCO Academic Search Premier database.  You can get the current passcodes from any of the regular branch libraries as long as you have a valid Beaufort County Library card. 

You can borrow Mark Kurlansky's The Big Oyster (2006) through the SCLENDS catalog. 

Bluffton Branch will share its copy of The Unnatural History of the Sea by Callum Roberts (2007), call number 909.09 ROB with anyone who has a valid BCL or SCLENDS partner library card.

You can even get the recipe for "Oyster Dressing" from one of our Local History & Nature pages.  

In the BDC we have a vertical file on "Oysters;" a document of the exhibit text of a 1996-1997 Beaufort Museum exhibit called "Time & Tide: A Century of Oystering in Beaufort County," and a delightful audio-interview segment about "Oysters / Bluffton Oyster Factory" by Joni Kost on the "Postcards from the Lowcountry" DVD.  

In other words, we have plenty to share on the topic of oysters!  Yum.  Yum.

Child Labor Lecture and Slide Show Aug. 23rd

Image courtesy of the Library of Congress

This is Bertha.  She is 6 years old.  She was an oyster shucker in the Maggioni Canning factory on Lady's Island circa 1912.  She began work each morning at 4 o'clock.  

Lewis Hine took this photograph and the photographs of many child laborers throughout the United States in the 1900s -1920s.  The power of his images resulted in changes in the law affecting the employment of children in manufacturing, canneries and agriculture.  

Yet, child labor remains an issue today in many parts of the world - and it is a theme within the One County Reads One Country: Afghanistan project selection In The Sea There Are Crocodiles.

               

Come learn about local child laborers during the free

"History of Child Labor in Beaufort District"

Presentation by Grace Cordial, BDC Manager
Thurs., Aug. 23rd
6:00 - 7:00 pm
2nd Floor, 311 Scott Street
(Upstairs in the Library building).

Anyone over age 12 interested in this local history topic is encouraged to attend.  

* "One County Reads One Country: Afghanistan" has been made possible through a Library Services and Technology Act grant awarded to the Beaufort County Library and administered by the South Carolina State Library.

August BDC@ The Branches Programs

Join us!

We'd love to see you, particularly if you are over age 12, and enjoy history, culture, our local environment, genealogy, archaeology and/or libraries and archives.

The programs are free.

 The 1940 Census related workshops require pre-registration as space is extremely limited - and may be gone by the time this entry posts!  Contact information for each "Introduction to the 1940 Census Workshop" session is provided in the flyer illustrating this entry.

* "One County Reads One Country: Afghanistan" has been made possible through a Library Services and Technology Act grant awarded to the Beaufort County Library and administered by the South Carolina State Library.

Reminder:  The Research Room is currently closed for lunch through Monday, August 13th.

BDC Contributions to "1 County Reads 1 Country: Afghanistan" Project

The BDC is contributing to the "One County Reads One Country: Afghanistan" project in several ways.

One hundred years ago, Progressives advocated for restrictions on the use of young children in industries and commercial ventures.  Some changes were legislated yet child labor remains a contemporary issue in many countries today.  Because child labor is a theme within the Young Adult selection, In the Sea There are Crocodiles, we decided to explore the history of child labor here in the Beaufort District.  Come learn about local industries that used children as a significant portion of their labor force well into the 1930s.  Expect to see some rather shocking images of labor conditions in northern Beaufort County, Port Royal, and Bluffton.

The first presentation will occur just outside the BDC Research Room door on Thursday evening, August 23rd.  Three weeks later, we'll do the same presentation in Bluffton Branch during the afternoon. 
 
Tea and the ceremonies around drinking tea cross cultures.  The displays will reinforce the significance of the beverage across history and cultures throughout the world.

Be sure to pick up a booklet of the activities at the branch library closest to you.  Check out the program schedule on our Library website.  Please join us for one (or many more) of the offerings.  We'd love to see you!

* "One County Reads One Country: Afghanistan" has been made possible through a Library Services and Technology Act grant awarded to the Beaufort County Library and administered by the South Carolina State Library.

Reminder:  The Research Room will be closed Noon to 1 pm through Mon., August 13th.

Twilight on the South Carolina Rice Fields is Now Available

As I promised earlier this week: Copies of Twilight on the South Carolina Rice Fields are now available in the local history sections at all our Branch Libraries under call number 975.703 HEY.

Still not convinced that this book is for you? Here's what our own beloved USC-B Professor Emeritus and Public Library Foundation of Beaufort County Board Member, Dr. Larry Rowland, wrote in his review of this title for USC Press:

"The saga of the Heyward family of the Carolina Lowcountry is nearly unsurpassed in American history. Colonel Daniel Heyward fought Indians and Spaniards in the early eighteenth century and carved an empire from the Southern frontier to become the largest planter in South Carolina and one of the richest men in America. His oldest son, Thomas, signed the Declaration of Independence, and his youngest son, Nathaniel, became one of the leading practitioners of tidal culture rice and the largest slave owner in the history of the South. On the eve of the Civil War, the tentacles of Heyward family wealth stretched from New York to Texas. The family letters published here for the first time recount the decline of that vast fortune as a consequence of the Civil War and Reconstruction. Expertly edited by Margaret Belser Hollis and Allen Stokes, and with an illuminating introduction by eminent economic historian Peter Coclanis, this collection of letters will be a classic of South Carolina history and it should be eagerly sought by specialists and enthusiasts alike."

Enjoy!

HBF Lecture: Twilight on the South Carolina Rice Fields

Historic Beaufort Foundation is continuing its "Dinner & a Lecture" series on July 26th with a presentation about Heyward Family correspondence relating to demise of rice production during the mid-19th century. That evening, Dr. Allen H. Stokes, Jr. of the South Caroliniana Library and Margaret Belser Hollis, a Heyward family descendant, will lecture on the Twilight on the South Carolina Rice Fields drawing from the family letters written between 1863 and 1871. For more information about this HBF event, call Historic Beaufort Foundation at 379-3331.

If you'd like to know more about rice plantations and production, here are a few suggestions you can explore in other parts of the Beaufort County Library even while the BDC Research Room is closed for relocation:

1) Read these Connections entries about rice and Thomas Heyward in this blog.

2) Some of the sources for information about Thomas Heyward, Jr. posted online in the "Local Notables" section about him in the "Recommended Reading" are available in other parts of the Beaufort County Library.

3) We filmed the Beaufort County Historical Society Papers years ago. You can find #55 Rice, Indigo and the Carolina Lowcountry (1974) on microfilm at both the Beaufort and Hilton Head Island Branch Libraries.

4) Let's say that you want to do find what how large the harvest for rice was on a particular plantation or farm. One can uncover that information through the United States Original Agriculture, Industry, Social Statistics, and Mortality Schedules for South Carolina, 1850-1880 -- and the BCL provides two ways to see the information:

A) Copies of the United States Original Agriculture, Industry, Social Statistics, and Mortality Schedules for South Carolina, 1850-1880 is on microfilm at Beaufort Branch for the time being.
B) Ancestry Library Edition subscription database also includes the United States Original Agriculture, Industry, Social Statistics, and Mortality Schedules for South Carolina, 1850-1880 -- although it is a little tricky to find it. Please ask one of our competent Reference librarians to show you how to use this database -- or any of our other subscription databases. Explaining how resources work is what reference librarians do.

Copies of Twilight on the South Carolina Rice Fields are in our Technical Services department. When Technical Services staff finish doing what has to be done to release the books for the local history sections, I will post an update here in Connections for you.

Click here for the BCL Branch Hours and Locations.

Phosphate Industry in Beaufort County

Part-time Beaufort resident, Marty Davis, just published a very interesting article about a relatively unknown topic of great importance in the economic history of our area in the South Carolina Historical Magazine (SCHM). Here's a little snippet to whet your appetite to learn more about what Davis discovered in his research into the impact of the phosphate industry locally:

The South Carolina phosphate boom, which peaked in the last decade of the nineteenth century, is often described as a Charleston phenomenon.... While phosphates were found near South Carolina's major port, the bulk of the rock mined in the state and the profits generated by it came from Beaufort County. But few fortunes in Beaufort grew from that industry. The county was left with devastated lands ... and unemployed workers. [The story] is one of exploitation and abandonment.

Come to the BDC to read "Coosaw Rock Alchemy: A Short History of River-Phosphate Mining in Beaufort County," by John Martin Davis, Jr., SCHM, vol. 109, no. 4(October 2008), pp. 269-294. [The SCHM tends to run about 12 to 14 months behind schedule so the issue actually has a date of October 2008].

One of the local companies involved in phosphate mining was the Pacific Guano Company. We were very fortunate to receive a donation of photographs from the descendants of two mining engineers, Conrad Donner and Leonard Donner, who worked for Pacific Guano. Conrad Donner was an amateur photographer who left images of some of the phosphate mining operations on Chisolm Island for posterity.

We named the digital version of the contents of the donated albums "Phosphate, Farms, and Family: The Donner Collection." You can view the entire collection online. Select the "Browse by Subject" button and headings Pacific Guano Company; Chisolm Islands; Phosphate Industry; and Phosphate Mines for best results.

Podcast: Lecture on Slavery by Philip D. Morgan

Since 1996, Gilder Lehrman Historians’ Forums have presented dozens of eminent historians discussing their latest books. Now you can hear these lectures on your computer, iPod, or other portable media player. One that directly to relates to the history, culture, and environment of our area is:

Philip D. Morgan
“Slave Counterpoint: Black Culture in the Eighteenth-Century Chesapeake and Lowcountry,” recorded at the Morgan Library, (New York City) on January 22, 2001
Running Time: 32:27

In this lecture, historian Philip D. Morgan compares the Lowcountry and Chesapeake slave cultures and reveals much about the way of life of some of the earliest African Americans. Although South Carolina in the eighteenth century was built by slave labor, Virginia only began to “recruit” slaves in large numbers at the beginning of that century. Consequently, there were substantial differences in the black cultures that emerged in the two regions.

If you'd rather read Slave Counterpoint, we have 3 copies in our library system. Look for this book at call number 975.5 MOR in the BDC, at Hilton Head Branch or at Beaufort Branch.

Libraries Offer Free Relief from Troubled Times

NBC ran a news report on Dec. 10th about how libraries are helping citizens cope with hard times while ever increasing numbers of library customers are putting strains on libraries also being subjected to serious financial cutbacks in local government budgets. See the video at http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22425001/vp/28165432#28165432. --gmc

Rice: A South Carolina Tradition

Rice...

• It has been labeled the "food of the world" because nearly 2/3 of the world's population considers it an essential food staple.
• Today, the United States is one of the world's largest producers, exporting to over 100 countries worldwide.
• South Carolina was the leading producer for almost two centuries; from the late 1600s to the late 1800s, nearly 1/3 of the entire North American crop was grown in South Carolina.

September marks the annual celebration of National Rice Month (established in 1991). It is a time to enjoy the taste, versatility, and immense economic contribution of rice to our national economy. For South Carolinians, rice is more than a delicious side dish. It is the building block of the everyday meal, a monument to Carolina agricultural history, and a way of life. In face, many lowcountry born and reared children grew up eating rice twice a day, every day, at lunch and supper.

Carolina planters cultivated rice in the coastal tidewater rivers of the lowcountry--mainly the Waccamaw, Santee, Cooper, Ashley, Combahee, and Savannah Rivers. While it is sometimes perceived that rice was grown on most plantations in the lowcountry, according to the Census of Agriculture of 1859, less than 40% of lowcountry farms grew any rice at all.

While cultivating rice was less labor intensive and less hazardous than growing sugar cane, it was rather more intensive than raising tobacco. African slaves were well suited to the tropical summer climates, tolerant to malaria and yellow fever, and previously acquainted with rice cultivation. These factors greatly increased the popularity of West African slave labor in the Carolina rice culture.

Rice production required skilled laborers, and lots of them. The larger the number of slaves on a plantation, the more likely that rice was cultivated by the planter. By 1860, nearly 1/3 of plantations with over 300 slaves and nearly 2/3 of plantations with over 500 slaves produced rice. The largest rice planter in the United States in 1860 was Joshua Ward (of the Waccamaw River area, Georgetown District, SC), owner of 1,092 slaves.

The American Civil War and Emancipation coupled with steadily declining soil quality and a series of destructive hurricanes heralded the demise of the Carolina rice culture. But fear not! Authentically grown "Carolina Gold" rice can still be found, thanks, in part, to the efforts of Dr. Richard Schulze of Turnbridge Plantation in Hardeeville, SC. After a nearly 60 year shortage, this gourmet southern staple can grace tables once again. California, Arkansas, Louisiana and Texas may grow the majority of the United States' rice, but the history and tradition of rice cultivation will always remain fundamentally Carolinian.

To learn more about local rice cultivation, visit the Beaufort District Collection at 311 Scott Street, Beaufort, South Carolina 29902.

Suggested Reading

• B Alston. Rice Planter and Sportsman: The Recollections of J. Motte Alston, 1821-1909
• 306.3 DUS. Them Dark Days: Slavery in the American Rice Swamps by William Dusinberre
• 633.18 SCH. Carolina Gold Rice: The Ebb and Flow History of a Lowcountry Cash Crop by Richard Schulze
• 633.1857 CAM. The History of the Rice Industry in South Carolina to the Civil War by Harriett Z. Campbell
• 633.3318 DOA. Rice and Rice Planting in the South Carolina Low Country by David Doar
• 975.7 LIN. Historical Atlas of the Rice Plantations of the ACE River Basin--1860 by Suzanne Cameron Linder
• 975.702 LIT. Rice and Slaves: Ethnicity and the Slave Trade in Colonial South Carolina by Daniel C. Littlefield
• 975.702 LIT. Rice and the Making of South Carolina: An Introductory Essay by Daniel C. Littlefield
• 975.789 SOU. The South Carolina Rice Plantation: As Revealed in the Papers of Robert F. W. Allston
• 975.79 HEY. Seed From Madagascar by Duncan Clinch Heyward
• 975.79 PRI. A Woman Rice Planter by Elizabeth Allston Pringle
• Beaufort County Historical Society Paper: "Rice, Indigo, and the Carolina Lowcountry" by Gerhard Spieler
• Vertical File: Rice
  

(image courtesy of The Library of Congress, Digital Collections)

Bank Failures are Nothing New

Please note: This post was last updated May 1, 2023.  All information and links were accurate as of this date. Bank failures have been in the news - again - since March 10, 2023 when the Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) did not survive a bank run.  It was "the second-largest bank failure in United States history and the largest since the 2007–2008 financial crisis. It was one of three March 2023 United States bank failures." And I woke up to the news with the seizure and purchase of the First Republic Bank. Makes one wonder if it is indeed true that "The more things change, the more they stay the same." - Grace Cordial 

We are surrounded by bad financial news. Turn on your television set, listen to Talk or National Public Radio, visit the major news outlets online, (such as CNN) and you will find out plenty about bank failures.

Beaufort District did not have any local financial institution before Gen. Saxton advocated a bank for the newly freed slaves to learn "habits of carefulness and prudence" during the Civil War.

• You can peruse the online version of "New South Newspaper," a part of the University of South Carolina's Digital Collections, to read more about Gen. Saxton's efforts to get a branch of the Freedman's Bank in Beaufort.
• We also hold the New South, Free South, and Palmetto Herald on microfilm for the customer who loves reading old newspapers. [It can take awhile, but oh, it is ever so much fun!]

You can read plenty about Reconstruction era financial difficulties in "Bankless in Beaufort: A Reexamination of the 1873 Failure of the Freedmans Savings Branch at Beaufort, South Carolina," by John Martin Davis, Jr. in the South Carolina Historical Magazine, vol. 104, January 2003, pp. 25-55. The author is both an attorney as well as an accountant. It takes both skill sets to figure out what really happened!

• If you want to see Freedman's Bank Records, FamilySearch.org allows browsing the records. 
• The DiscoverFreedmen.org website allows you to search for specific people in the records including those of the Freedman's Bank.
• When the Freedman's Bank failed, it left behind some crucial records for anyone doing African-American family research. Although the extent of the information can vary widely, it is one of the best sources of genealogical information to get you ever closer to that key 1870 Census.

For 20th century bank failures, let's visit the year 1926.

Beaufort County had 3 banks at the start of the year. By September, only 2 survived. 7 persons were tried in Federal court for the Bank of Beaufort failure. When W.J. Thomas was appointed Receiver, it took 6 cars to tote the books, records, papers and documents to Columbia for the trial. You can follow what transpired through the back files of the Beaufort Gazette, available in the Beaufort District Collection and at Beaufort Branch Library. Here's an excerpt from the front page of the Beaufort Gazette's January 12, 1928 issue to whet your appetite to learn more:

Some of the defendants are also listed in our Online Obituary File index. The obituary cards are on file in the BDC. You can come read the appropriate cards and make photocopies of them for yourself during your scheduled appointment. 

According to Alexia Helsley in Beaufort: A History (2005), p. 175:

"On 10 July 1926, the Bank of Beaufort closed, never to reopen. Its failure was unexpected with a wide-ranging effect. Individuals’ savings disappeared, as did business accounts and credit opportunities. The bank closing cost several of the Beaufort churches their savings and checking accounts....According to Judge Thomas, the bank failure plunged Beaufort into a depression that lasted until 1939.”

How can you learn more the history of banking or other economic activities in Beaufort County?

• Check out Helsley's book from any of the Library's circulating branches.
  
• Come to the BDC to read the contents of the Banks [BDC Vertical File]. It contains newspaper clippings to give you a quick start to your research.
• You can use the Martin Newspaper Index to locate additional news articles from the Palmetto Post (1882-1906) and the Beaufort Gazette (1903-1936).
• You can read and print articles from the Palmetto Post and Beaufort Gazette in the BDC Research Room. We charge .25 per photocopy of microfilm page or sometimes images of the newspaper microfilm come out well enough as cell phone images.

Reminder for those reading in the year 2023: 

Limited access to the Research Room remains in effect due to a permanent staff shortage since January 2020. Contact us at 843-255-6468 or via bdc@bcgov.net in advance to have the best chance of securing your preferred date and time. The BDC is not open for researchers on Saturdays or Sundays. We are unable to accept drop-ins or same day appointments. 

 

Interested in Industry?

Indigo, rice, sea island cotton, phosphate, oysters, shrimp, and timber are just a few of the economic endeavors of the Historic Beaufort District. The military presence, shipping industry, and tourism also make their mark in the history of this economically diverse area of South Carolina. Regardless of your specific economic/industrial topic, the Beaufort District Collection is the place to start your research! Whether you are compiling information for formal research or just to satisfy your personal historical curiosity, the BDC can help.

Wondering where to start? The following resources are available at the BDC:

General Economic History Books

This list is a starter guide for researchers. If you are looking for a particular industry (such as cotton, rice, seafood, or military, among many others) we have a variety of materials designed to suit your topic! See what we have, visit our Online Catalog.

330.973 GAL V1 (& V2). Gale Encyclopedia of U.S. Economic History edited by Thomas Carson
This title is only available in the Reference section @ the Beaufort Branch.

330.9757 COC The Shadow of a Dream: Economic Life and Death in the South Carolina Low Country, 1670-1920 by Peter A. Coclanis
This title is also available through the Bluffton Branch!

975.7 EDG. South Carolina: A History by Walter Edgar
This title is available @ Beaufort Branch, Bluffton Branch, Hilton Head Island Branch, and Lobeco Branch!

975.799 ROW V1. The History of Beaufort County, South Carolina, Volume 1: 1514-1861 by Lawrence S. Rowland, Alexander Moore, and George C. Rogers, Jr.
This title is available through all branch libraries!

975.799 TAY. Historic Beaufort County: An Illustrated History by Michael C. Taylor
This title is available through all branch libraries!

Vertical Files

Agriculture
Banks
Beaufort—City—Annual Reports
Beaufort—County – Statistics
Blue Channel Corporation
Bridges (and subheadings)
Census (various dates)
Cotton
Development Issues
Distilling, Illicit
Drug Traffic
Ferries
Fires (various dates)
Fishing
Fripp Island—Legislation
Indigo
Industry
Marine Corps Air Station, Beaufort
Marine Corps Recruit Depot
Merchants
Migrant Workers
Mines and Mineral Resources
Motion Pictures
Oysters
Phosphate Mines and Mining
Plantations
Port Royal Railroad Company
Primate -- Research
Real Estate Companies
Rice
Seafood Industry
Shipping
Shrimp
Tenneco Plant
Tomatoes
Tourism
Waddell Mariculture Center
Water Supply

Newspapers on Microfilm

In addition to having today’s local newspapers available, we also have microfilmed copies of local papers starting from 1864! View our list of available microfilmed newspapers.

Other Microfilm Resources

MICROCOPY 2: United States Census. Original Agriculture, Industry, Social Statistics, and Mortality Schedules for South Carolina, 1850-1880

MICROCOPY 13: South Carolina Reports and Resolutions, 1868-1900: With a Finding Aid to Reports and Resolutions, 1784-1900

MICROCOPY 17: Petitions to the General Assembly

*Remember that materials located in the BDC are not available for checkout. These materials will always be available to local history researchers! BDC hours are M – F: 10 AM – 5 PM.The Beaufort District Collection is a division of the Beaufort County Library, a department of Beaufort County Government of South Carolina.