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- SC National History Day Students Participate at the Top Level
For Immediate Release: Contact: Mary Katherine Marshall
June 20, 2011 mmarshall@scdah.state.sc.us/803-896-6124
“We are incredibly proud of our students for all of the time and effort they put in to their projects,” said SC NHD State Coordinator, Mary Katherine Marshall. “These students have not only deepened their understanding of their chosen topics, but have also been energized by learning. This program truly brings history to life for students.”
Representing the Palmetto State at this year’s national competition were sixty-three middle and high school students who each developed entries based on this year’s theme: Debate & Diplomacy: Successes, Failures, Consequences. Entries included group and individual projects in all categories and at both the Junior and Senior Levels in performance, exhibits, documentaries, historic paper and website.
NHD is a year-long academic organization for elementary and secondary school students focused on the teaching and learning of history. A recent study by Rockman, et al found students who participate in NHD develop a range of college and career-ready skills, and outperform their peers on state standardized tests in multiple subjects, including reading, science, math and social studies.
The program annually engages more than half a million students across the nation. Students research history topics of their choice related to an annual theme and create exhibits, documentaries, performances, and papers, which they may enter in competitions at the district, state, and national levels.
More than 300 historians and other education professionals evaluate the work of over 2,000 students at the NHD contest. Over $250,000 in scholarships and cash prizes were awarded at the awards ceremony this year.
The South Carolina Archives and History Foundation is pleased to have given more than $5,000 in scholarships to SC students thanks to the program’s generous sponsors including: The Lipscomb Family Foundation, Humanities Council SC, The SC Archives and History Foundation, Wells Fargo, NHD, BCBS of SC and many more.
For more information on NHD, visit www.nhd.org.
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About National History Day
National History Day (NHD) is a year-long academic organization for elementary and secondary school students. Each year, more than half a million students, encouraged by thousands of teachers nationwide participate in the NHD contest. Students choose historical topics related to a theme and conduct extensive primary and secondary research through libraries, archives, museums, oral history interviews and historic sites. After analyzing and interpreting their sources and drawing conclusions about their topics’ significance in history, students present their work in original papers, websites, exhibits, performances and documentaries. These products are entered into competitions in the spring, at local, state and national levels where they are evaluated by professional historians and educators. The program culminates in a national competition each June held at the
Visit www.nhd.org.
- Foundation Officer Elections Unanimous
For more information, contact:
Mary Katherine Marshall, Executive Director
803.896.6124
mmarshall@scdah.state.sc.us
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: July 25, 2011
SC Archives and History Foundation Elects New Slate of Officers
COLUMBIA, SC–The South Carolina Archives and History Foundation would like to welcome their newly elected officers to the Executive Committee: Chairman—X. Willard Polk of Camden; Vice-Chairman—Eric Wm. Ruschky of Columbia; Treasurer—Wm. Frank Lee of Lugoff; Secretary—Ruth “Lady” Hodges of Edgefield; At Large Members are—The Honorable Gary E. Clary of Central, and Charles P. Boyd of Atlanta.
Officer Elections were held last Monday, July 18 at the SC Archives and History Center on Parklane Road in Columbia at the quarterly board meeting with unanimous approval by the Foundation’s Board of Directors.The South Carolina Archives and History Foundation’s full Board of Directors includes: Frank Beattie of Georgetown, Curtis Campbell of Orangeburg, Kathryn D. Durham of Columbia, Walter Edgar of Columbia, Eric Wm. Emerson of Columbia, A. V. Huff of Greenville, Phil Noble of Charleston, and Rodger E. Stroup of Columbia.
The South Carolina Archives & History Foundation supports the efforts of the South Carolina Department of Archives and History. It is the caretaker of the South Carolina Archives, a collection of more than 325 years of historical documents recording the rich and diverse history of the people and government of South Carolina. In addition to preserving the documentary and cultural history of the Palmetto State, the Department also administers a variety of programs through the State Historic Preservation Office that help identify, recognize and preserve the state's architectural and archaeological heritage.
For more information on how you can support the SCHAF, please call 803.896.6124 or visit www.palmettohistorysc.org.
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- Remembering Secession Ordinance Signers, provided by The State 12/6/2010
Monday, Dec. 06, 2010
Civil War: Remembering Secession Ordinance signers
Amid Old South nostalgia on 150th anniversary, some acknowledge signers unleashed war
By CAROLYN CLICK - cclick@thestate.comThe great-great-grandsons and great-great-granddaughters of the signers of the Ordinance of Secession, along with at least one cousin “four-times removed,” gathered Sunday to honor their ancestors and remember the 1860 convention in Columbia and Charleston that sparked the Civil War.
The United Daughters of Confederacy sponsored the memorial event, held at the S.C. Department of Archives and History, which displayed the historic document for the 200 or so spectators. There was a wreath, a roll call of signers, ladies in period costume, salutes to the U.S., South Carolina and Confederate States of America flag, and a rousing chorus of “Dixie” at the conclusion.
But amid the Old South nostalgia was some acknowledgement that the signers — mostly powerful, wealthy, slaveholding men — had unleashed a bloody war that would leave the South devastated and destitute for generations.
“This was an act which carried with it a great price,” said David Rutledge, a descendant of the secession convention’s president David F. Jamison. “D.F. Jamison and men like him would sow the winds of war but it would be his wife, his children and his children’s children who would reap the whirlwind.”
Jamison himself would die during the war and his sons suffer. His family plantation, Burwood, was destroyed by Union Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman, leaving Jamison’s wife, Elizabeth, and minor children in abject poverty, Rutledge, a Greenville attorney, told the gathering.
Another signer, John Saunders Palmer, lost two sons in the war. When a locket worn by his son James Palmer was returned to him, along with the bullet which killed him, John Saunders Palmer told his wife: “You take the locket, I’ll take the bullet — I’m the one who put it in him,” Rutledge recounted.
Everyone, it seemed, had a story to tell and at the reception following, many shared family stories handed down from generation to generation. Carol Perrin Cobb of Greenville and Jean Perrin Derrick of Lexington, great-great-grand-nieces of signer Thomas Charles Perrin, of Abbeville, had slightly different versions of the tale of their ancestor allegedly throwing the great seal of South Carolina into the Savannah River.
Cobb said she has never felt anything but pride in her ancestor’s participation in the secession convention and gets perturbed when others suggest their cause was tainted by the Confederates’ fierce adherence to slavery.
“They don’t realize that we were fighting the Revolutionary War again,” she said.
But Rutledge noted that the “good names of the signers have been sullied” over the last 50 years, a development he regrets.
Over those years, historians have delved more deeply into the causes and impact of the war and the federal Reconstruction period that followed, probed the lives of slaves and their descendants, and drawn connections to the civil rights era and 21st century politics.
As the sesquicentennial is marked in the state, Eric Emerson, executive director of the S.C. Department of Archives and History, hopes that people will develop “a deeper level of understanding” of secession and war that goes beyond the nostalgia and gets at the heart of one of the most turbulent and talked about periods in South Carolina history.
Rutledge said he would hope that that the “the names of our ancestors will be continued to be honored — by ourselves, by our children and by our children’s children.”
But he said his own children, in their 20s, have no interest in the Civil War.
About 75 descendants were among the 200 who attended the afternoon event, said Nita Keisler, registrar of the Mary Boykin Chesnut chapter of the UDC.
Most were graying, but there was at least one young descendant, who was a great-great-great-great-grandson of one of the signers.
Sponsorship Opportunities
The South Carolina Archives and History Foundation needs your financial support in order to continue to serve the people of our state. Gifts support exhibits, research materials for the Reference Room, programs, education, and building upkeep and enhancement projects. Perhaps you have enjoyed the benefits of the programs and services at the South Carolina Department of Archives and History and offered by the Foundation. If so, consider giving to the Foundation. Your gift will help strengthen and expand our reach as an educational and cultural entity, as well as support new and continued programs.
Print out the Donor Form and send your gift today!
Designated Gifts
You may designate your gift to a specific area. Here is what your donation can do:
- $100.00 Pages in History - Purchase a Book for the Research Room
- $250.00 Auditorium Seat Sponsorship
- $500.00 Sponsor a student at National History Day national contest
- $1,000.00 Provide materials for National History Day students in SC
- $1,000.00 Underwrite publication and mailing of one issue of The New SC Gazette
- $1,000.00 Provide speakers for lecture series
- $1,500.00 Microfilm Reader Sponsorship
Corporate and Individual Sponsorship
The South Carolina Archives and History Foundation invites corporations and individuals to sponsor exhibits, programs such as National History Day, the Friends annual event or one of many workshops. For more information, call the Foundation office at (803) 251-0115.
Memorials/Tributes
Honor a loved one with a memorial or tribute gift to the South Carolina Archives and History Foundation. Tribute contributions will support the South Carolina Archives and History Foundation’s Endowment Fund. You can do so by purchasing a chair in the Center's state of the art audiotrium for $250.00. Each chair back will have a nameplate with your engraved inscription honoring or memorializing your loved one. See attached brochure for more details.
Microfilm Reader and Auditorium Seat Sponsorships
The South Carolina Archives and History Center Auditorium can accommodate an audience of 220 for lectures, cultural events, special presentations, and satellite programs. For $250 your name will be engraved on a plate and placed on the back of a chair. For More Information...
Reference Room microfilm readers provide access to thousands of rolls of film providing a record of South Carolina history.
By sponsoring an auditorium seat ($250) or a microfilm reader ($1500), you can help guarantee that students, researchers and other visitors will enjoy quality educational programming and access to the state’s valuable documents.
Pages in History Project
Another way to donate is to purchase a book needed by the Reference Room. Visit this page for a list of 'wanted' books, then contact the Foundation office to make your gift.
For more information on these opportunities, please call the Foundation office at (803) 251-0115
All gifts are deductible for income tax purposes to the extent of the law. The South Carolina Archives and History Foundation is an IRS-certified, non-profit, 501(c)(3) entity. Our tax identification number is 57-0955680.