Walter Edgar

This week we will be talking with Jonathan Stuhlman and Martha Severens about their book, Southern/Modern: Rediscovering Southern Art from the First Half of the Twentieth Century (2024, UNC Press). Jonathan Stuhlman is the Senior Curator of American Art at the Mint Museum in Charlotte, NC, and Martha Severens is in independent scholar based in the upstate of South Carolina. Together they have created a book that springs from an exhibition at the Mint but is so much more than just a catalog for the exhibit.

“C” is for Chester County (581 square miles; 2020 population 32,294). Named for Chester County, Pennsylvania, Chester was one of seven counties created in 1785 from the old Camden Judicial District.

“G” is for Greens. South Carolina has a long history of cooking greens

“H” is for Hollis, Lawrence Peter (1883-1978). Educator, social worker.

“H” is for Holman, Clarence Hugh (1914-1981). Educator, author. Hugh Clarence Holman’s many honors culminated in his appointment as Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Dr. Kendra Hamilton’s book, Romancing the Gullah in the Age of Porgy and Bess, is a literary and cultural history of a place: the Gullah Geechee Coast, a four-state area that’s one of only a handful of places that can truly be said to be the “cradle of Black culture” in the United States.

“W” is for Williston (Barnwell County; 2020 population 2,876). Located on U.S. Highway 78 in Barnwell County, Williston is named for early settlers.

Bridging divides? The Arthur Ravenel Jr., Bridge in Charleston.

“S” is for Sherman’s march. This campaign under General William Tecumseh Sherman is one of the more controversial of the Civil War.

This time out we’ll be talking with Tracey Todd, the Director of Museums for the Historic Charleston Foundation, and Andrew Agha, an archaeologist working on the site of the Nathaniel Russell house, a National Historic Landmark on Meeting Street. We’ll be talking about the Foundation’s most recent preservation initiative which involves the kitchen house, an ancillary structure that included a kitchen, laundry, and living quarters for the enslaved.Nathaniel Russell arrived in Charleston from Bristol, Rhode Island in 1765 and, thanks to extensive contacts in his home colony, established himself as a successful merchant and trader of captive Africans. In 1808 the Russell family moved to their new townhome at 51 Meeting Street. Accompanying them were as many as eighteen enslaved people who toiled in the work yard, gardens, stable, kitchen and laundry.By uncovering the material history contained in the kitchen house, the Foundation hopes to further illuminate the lives of the men, women, and children who lived and worked there.