Industry and the Gilded Age (1878-1889)

During the era before home rule, when South Carolina remained primarily rural, managing county farms and chain gangs was an essential function of county government.

Known as Sallie F. Chapin, she became one of South Carolina’s most visible nineteenth-century women leaders...A powerful lecturer, she drew the attention of women and men, and her lectures became the first exposure to women’s public leadership for many of her audiences and followers.

Chesnut was considered a moderate in South Carolina politics. He was a strong defender of slavery and states’ rights but saw secession as viable only as a last resort and with the complete cooperation of other southern states.

No other southern writer of her era possessed the combination of literary cultivation, psychological perception, opportunity to observe closely the upper echelons of the Confederacy, and a willingness to write candidly about people, events, and issues—including slavery.

Cheap to employ, easily controlled, and with small, nimble fingers, children were well suited to perform the repetitive, minor tasks that the textile industry demanded.

In addition to this major contribution to the Confederate war effort, Chisolm devised a more efficient inhaler for the administration of chloroform, an anesthetic that was in short supply in the Confederate army.

Abbie Christensen was a progressive force for women’s rights, black and white education, racial tolerance, and social welfare in South Carolina from the 1890s until her death.

South Carolina heralds the moderation of its leadership during the civil rights era, especially when compared to the actions of leaders in other Deep South states. Moderate leaders put accommodation over confrontation and worked within the legal framework. But these same leaders also did all they could to manipulate the government and the legal system to forestall civil rights.

One of Clemson’s most passionate postwar goals was to establish a college to provide practical education in agriculture and the sciences, as he believed that there would be “no hope for the South short of widespread scientific education.”

Georgia Alden Cleveland kept a detailed dairy from 1890 to 1914 in which she chronicled life as an upper-class, married, southern white female.

It was Charles Coker who brought modern industrial and managerial practice to the family-controlled business. He established an industrial research and development program, developed a dedicated sales staff, and emphasized long-range planning.

From the World War I era until his death, Coker became an agricultural evangelist, promoting diversification, improved farming methods, and his seeds through numerous speeches, articles, and personal visits.

Coker's mill and process had a significant influence on the future development of the southern pulp mill industry. In the years following, Coker expanded the firm as it supplied pulp and paper products throughout the country.

Along with his varied business concerns, Coker took a strong interest in promoting education. Largely through his efforts and financing, Coker College, originally a liberal arts college for women (later coeducational), was established in Hartsville in 1908. Coker’s long and successful career provided a human face to the state’s successful transition from the Old South to the New South.

In South Carolina the dominion of the Conservative Party had a specific beginning and ending: the election of the Confederate hero Wade Hampton III as governor in 1876 and the election of Benjamin R. Tillman as governor in 1890, following a bitter campaign in which Tillman had vilified the Conservatives for being wedded to the past and neglecting the state’s real problems.

Although revised several times until abandoned in 1698, the Fundamental Constitutions framed the colony as a social hierarchy, encouraging new settlement based on landownership and a provision for religious freedom.

In addition to establishing one of the most important industrial enterprises in Spartanburg County, Converse contributed to the educational institution in Spartanburg that bears his name.

Convict leasing came to an end in South Carolina in the 1890s. Its origins lay in the economic demands of a war-torn region and in whites’ desire to use the state’s criminal justice system to control a newly emancipated black population. Changing economic circumstances in the 1890s robbed leasing of its financial appeal.

Through tireless self-promotion, Coogler and his poetry garnered the attention of readers and reviewers from across the nation, who found his work entertaining if not aesthetic. Facetious reviews and parodies of his work found their way into dozens of newspapers and other periodicals.

In 1907 Cooke took a three-day federal civil service examination in Boston (blacks were not allowed to take the test in Washington, D.C.). He passed and was assigned to the office of the supervising architect at the United States Treasury Department, the first black man to be employed there.