Charleston, South Carolina

Charleston is the oldest major city in the Southeast U.S., a center of culture and politics for over 200 years. It was captured by the British in 1780 during the Revolution. It was the cockpit of the secession movement in 1860-61, and the first shots of the Civil War were fired in its harbor. The city escaped destruction during the war but failed to keep pace with northern cities as its hinterland sank into poverty. World War II and the Cold War revived the city, with wave after wave of military spending. Today it is a major tourist center, featuring its historic architecture.

Art, Architecture, Literature, Science

• Cothran, James R. Gardens of Historic Charleston. U. of South Carolina Press, 1995. 177 pp.
• Greene, Harlan. Mr. Skylark: John Bennett and the Charleston Renaissance. U. of Georgia Press, 2001. 372 pp.
• Hutchisson, James M. and Greene, Harlan, ed. Renaissance in Charleston: Art and Life in the Carolina Low Country, 1900-1940. U. of Georgia Press, 2003. 259 pp.
• Hutchisson, James M. DuBose Heyward: A Charleston Gentleman and the World of Porgy and Bess. U. Press of Mississippi, 2000. 225 pp.
• McNeil, Jim. Charleston's Navy Yard: A Picture History. Charleston, S.C.: Coker Craft, 1985. 217 pp.
• O'Brien, Michael and Moltke-Hansen, David, ed. Intellectual Life in Antebellum Charleston. U. of Tennessee Press, 1986. 468 pp.
• Poston, Jonathan H. The Buildings of Charleston: A Guide to the City's Architecture. U. of South Carolina Press, 1997. 717 pp.
• Severens, Kenneth. Charleston: Antebellum Architecture and Civic Destiny. U. of Tennessee Press, 1988. 315 pp.
• Stephens, Lester D. Science, Race, and Religion in the American South: John Bachman and the Charleston Circle of Naturalists, 1815-1895. U. of North Carolina Press, 2000. 338 pp.
• Susan Sully; Charleston: Past and Present Rizzoli International Publications, 1998, on architecture. online edition
• Waddell, Gene. Charleston Architecture: 1670-1860. 2 vol. Charleston, S.C.: Wyrick, 2003. 992 pp.
• Watson, Charles S. Antebellum Charleston Dramatists University of Alabama Press, 1976 online edition
• Weyeneth, Robert R. Historic Preservation for a Living City: Historic Charleston Foundation, 1947-1997. (Historic Charleston Foundation Studies in History and Culture series.) U. of South Carolina Press, 2000. 256 pp.
• Yuhl, Stephanie E. A Golden Haze of Memory: The Making of Historic Charleston. U. of North Carolina Press, 2005. 285 pp.
• Zola, Gary Phillip. Isaac Harby of Charleston, 1788-1828: Jewish Reformer and Intellectual. U. of Alabama Press, 1994. 284 pp.

Race

• Bellows, Barbara L. Benevolence among Slaveholders: Assisting the Poor in Charleston, 1670-1860. Louisiana State U. Press, 1993. 217 pp.
• Drago, Edmund L. Initiative, Paternalism, and Race Relations: Charleston's Avery Normal Institute. U. of Georgia Press, 1990. 402 pp.
• Egerton, Douglas R. He Shall Go Out Free: The Lives of Denmark Vesey. Madison House, 1999. 248 pp. online review
• Greene, Harlan; Hutchins, Harry S., Jr.; and Hutchins, Brian E. Slave Badges and the Sl ave-Hire System in Charleston, South Carolina, 1783-1865. McFarland, 2004. 194 pp.
• Jenkins, Wilbert L. Seizing the New Day: African Americans in Post-Civil War Charleston. Indiana U. Press, 1998. 256 pp.
• Johnson, Michael P. and Roark, James L. No Chariot Let Down: Charleston's Free People of Color on the Eve of the Civil War. U. of North Carolina Press, 1984. 174 pp. online edition
• Kennedy, Cynthia M. Braided Relations, Entwined Lives: The Women of Charleston's Urban Slave Society. Indiana U. Press, 2005. 311 pp.
• Powers, Bernard E., Jr. Black Charlestonians: A Social History, 1822-1885. U. of Arkansas Press, 1994. 377 pp.