Category: African American History
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Spotlight On: Stephen Presley
Father Stephen Presley was born a slave in 1820. He was owned by Boykin Witherspoon, a prominent planter from Society Hill. Presley was a carpenter by trade. He married another slave by the name of Phyllis McIver Presley. Welsh Neck Baptist Church records indicate that the couple fellowshipped there as slaves but were dismissed in…
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Spotlight On: Darlington Memorial Cemetery
Located on Avenue D and Friendship Street in Darlington, the Darlington Memorial Cemetery was the first cemetery created for African-Americans in the community. The cemetery began in 1890 as a five-acre cemetery established by Macedonia Baptist Church and African-American citizens in Darlington. In 1946, Bethel A.M.E. Church and St. James Methodist Church established cemeteries across…
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Spotlight On: Arthur W. Stanley, veteran, activist, and councilman
Arthur W. Stanley, a native of Darlington, was a WWII veteran. He served in the Pacific Theater. Stanley was the president of the Darlington Chapter of the NAACP and held the position for 40 years. He led the efforts to desegregate the Darlington County Public School System as a plaintiff in Stanley v. Darlington County…
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Spotlight On: Dr. Daniel Collins
Dr. Daniel Collins, a Darlington native, was a 1932 graduate of the Darlington County Public Schools. He attended Paine College in Augusta, Georgia, where he received a B.S. degree in science and a D.D.S. degree from Meharry Medical College in Nashville, Tennessee. He also obtained a master’s degree in dental science from Guggenheim Clinic in…
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Spotlight On: Mayo School
From “Introduction: A History of Mayo School” About the year 1890, public education in Darlington County was started for African-Americans. One of the early buildings which the state and county used for education of African-Americans was located on Pearl Street in front of the old Charles estate, now Darlington Motel. Later in the year of…
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Spotlight On: Honorable Richard H. Humbert
Born in Charleston, Richard H. Humbert was a devoted resident of Darlington County. A former slave who taught himself to read and write, Humbert wrote his own pass for freedom. He was an active member of the South Carolina Republican Party and an organizer for African-Americans in 1868. In a letter to Governor R.K. Scott…
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SPOTLIGHT ON: Rosenwald Consolidated School/Rosenwald High School
The Julius Rosenwald Fund was established in 1915 to provide grants to African Americans for school construction. Rosenwald, the president of the Sears Roebuck Company, worked closely with Tuskeegee Institute in Alabama to develop the program.
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SPOTLIGHT ON: Jerusalem Baptist Church
Jerusalem Baptist Church, located at 6th Street and Laurens Avenue in Hartsville, is one of the oldest African-American churches in Darlington County. Organized after the Civil War, its first church service was held in a brush arbor on Snake Branch, a creek near E. Carolina Avenue. Jerusalem’s first permanent church, a log building, was built…
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SPOTLIGHT ON: Edmund H. Deas House
Located at 229 Avenue E in Darlington, the Edmund H. Deas House was named after Edmund H. Deas, who moved to Darlington in 1870. Known as the “Duke of Darlington,” Deas was a very active Republican and served as the county chair of the South Carolina Republican Party in 1884 and 1888. He was delegated…
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SPOTLIGHT ON: Senator Kay Patterson
Born in Darlington County on January 11, 1931, Kay Patterson represented the 19th District in the South Carolina Senate from 1985 until his retirement in 2008. Senator Patterson also served in the South Carolina House of Representatives from 1975 through 1985. He was the first African-American to sit on the University of South Carolina’s Board…