Environment and Geography

Although removed from the fighting during the Civil War, Abbeville nevertheless played a noteworthy role in the conflict.

Robert Mills called Abbeville “the original seat of learning in the upper country,” and it quickly distinguished itself as the mother of some very famous Carolinians.

The ACE Basin consists of around 350,000 acres in the watershed of the Ashepoo, Combahee, and Edisto Rivers in the South Carolina lowcountry.

Established in 1990, the ACE Basin National Wildlife Refuge (NWR) is part of the federal system of refuges managed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The refuge represents the federal role in the larger ACE Basin Project with two units, one on the Combahee River and the other on the Edisto River.

Aiken owes its existence to the South Carolina Railroad, its personality to its erstwhile “winter colony” of wealthy northern sports enthusiasts, and its economic vitality and relatively cosmopolitan spirit to the U.S. government’s massive Savannah River Site nuclear weapons facility.

Bounded on the west by the Savannah River, Aiken County lies at the western end of the state’s Sandhills region, whose poor soils necessitated the development of alternatives to farming. These nonagricultural alternatives defined much of the county’s history.

On the eve of the Civil War, per capita wealth for the free residents of All Saints was among the highest in the nation.

Construction of the Savannah River Site after World War II briefly transformed Allendale into a boomtown. But when Interstate 95 opened east of Allendale County, the tourist-oriented economy along U.S. 301 collapsed

Allendale is South Carolina’s youngest county, yet it contains the oldest known human habitation in the state.

Amethyst became the official South Carolina gemstone by a law signed by Governor Robert McNair on June 24, 1969.

Incorporated as a city in 1882, Anderson became a center of the Piedmont’s late nineteenth-century industrial expansion.

Industrial development in Anderson County began in earnest in the decades following the Civil War, and gradually replaced agriculture as the foundation of the county economy.

The town thrived in the 1920s, due in large part to the Seaboard Airline Railway Company railroad shops and the logging operations of the Atlantic Coast Lumber Company.

Three physiographic areas lie within the boundaries of South Carolina, the Blue Ridge, Piedmont, and coastal plain provinces. Each has its own characteristic habitats, and each contains certain animals that are adapted to those habitats and do not occur in the other two areas.

The subtropical climate and wealth created by plantation agriculture led to the emergence of distinctive forms and, in some cases, exceptionally sophisticated buildings. At the same time, the dominant theme in South Carolina architecture has always been the vernacular: common buildings designed to serve utilitarian purposes and lacking significant stylistic ornamentation.

Beginning in the 1920s, art has had a significant economic impact by virtue of its role in fostering tourism and later through museums dedicated to art.

Atlantic Beach flourished during the 1940s and 1950s as one of the few places on the East Coast where black families could enjoy beach vacations during the era of segregation.

The original edition of The Birds of America established Audubon’s reputation as America’s leading nature artist.

Ayllón’s colony did not succeed, but his efforts contributed much to European interest in and knowledge of the southeastern coast of North America.

Bachman consistently presented a sound scientific case for all races of humans as members of the same species. Drawing on his keen knowledge of the nature of species, he presented his argument in numerous articles and in The Doctrine of the Unity of the Human Races, Examined on the Principles of Science, published in 1850. Yet Bachman condoned slavery, and he was an unyielding defender of states’ rights.