Columbia is the capital city of the U.S. state of South Carolina. With a population of 136,632 at the 2020 census, it is the second-most populous city in South Carolina. The city serves as the county seat of Richland County, and a portion of the city extends into neighboring Lexington County. It is the center of the Columbia, SC Metropolitan Statistical Area, which had an estimated population of 858,302 in 2023, and is the 70th-most populous metropolitan statistical area in the United States. The name Columbia is a poetic term used for the United States, derived from the name of Christopher Columbus, who explored for the Spanish Crown. Columbia is often abbreviated as Cola, leading to its nickname as "Soda City".
Charleston is the most populous city in the U.S. state of South Carolina, the county seat of Charleston County, and the principal city in the Charleston metropolitan area. The city lies just south of the geographical midpoint of South Carolina's coastline on Charleston Harbor, an inlet of the Atlantic Ocean formed by the confluence of the Ashley, Cooper, and Wando rivers. Charleston had a population of 150,227 at the 2020 census. The population of the Charleston metropolitan area, comprising Berkeley, Charleston, and Dorchester counties, was estimated to be 849,417 in 2023. It ranks as the third-most populous metropolitan statistical area in the state, and the 71st-most populous in the United States.
The Methodist Episcopal Church, South was the American Methodist denomination resulting from the 19th-century split over the issue of slavery in the Methodist Episcopal Church (MEC). Disagreement on this issue had been increasing in strength for decades between churches of the Northern and Southern United States; in 1845 it resulted in a schism at the General Conference of the MEC held in Louisville, Kentucky.
Jonathan Clarkson Gibbs, II was an American Presbyterian minister who served as Secretary of State and Superintendent of Public Instruction of Florida, and, along with U.S. Congressman Josiah Thomas Walls, was among the most powerful black officeholders in the state during Reconstruction. An African American who served during the Reconstruction era, he was the first black Florida Secretary of State, holding the office over a century prior to the state's second black Secretary of State, Jesse McCrary, who served for five months in 1979.
Johns Island is an island in Charleston County, South Carolina, United States, and is the largest island in the state of South Carolina. Johns Island is bordered by the Wadmalaw, Seabrook, Kiawah, Edisto, Folly, and James islands; the Stono and Kiawah rivers separate Johns Island from its border islands. It is the fourth-largest island on the US east coast, surpassed only by Long Island, Mount Desert Island and Martha's Vineyard. Johns Island is 84 square miles (220 km2) in area, with a population of 21,500.
Francis James Grimké was an American Presbyterian minister in Washington, DC. He was regarded for more than half a century as one of the leading African-American clergy of his era and was prominent in working for equal rights. He was active in the Niagara Movement and helped found the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1909.
Rev. John Brown was the third president of the University of Georgia. He served in that capacity from 1811 until his resignation in 1816.
The South Carolina Military Academy was a predecessor, two-campus institution to The Citadel. It was established in 1842 by the South Carolina Legislature and classes began at the Arsenal (Columbia) in 1843. South Carolina had constructed a series of arsenals around the state after the Denmark Vesey planned slave revolt of 1822; these were consolidated into Columbia and Charleston arsenals. No longer seen as militarily necessary, they became in 1842 the South Carolina Military Academy, consisting of the Arsenal Academy in Columbia and the Citadel Academy in Charleston. During the Civil War students from both served as the Battalion of State Cadets; SCMA cadets were among the battalion which fired the first shots of the Civil War on January 9, 1861 while manning a gun emplacement on Morris Island, South Carolina which shelled the Union steamship Star of the West; the Battalion of State Cadets made up over a third of a Confederate force that defended a strategic rail bridge in the Battle of Tulifinny in 1864. The Arsenal Academy was burned by Union troops in 1865 and never reopened; the only surviving building became the South Carolina Governor's Mansion. The Citadel Academy and the South Carolina Military Academy closed in 1865; its buildings were in Federal hands until 1882. An 1882 act of the South Carolina Legislature reopened the South Carolina Military Academy, using only the campus in Charleston. Known commonly as The Citadel Academy, the school was renamed in 1910 as The Citadel, after the name "Academy" became common to high schools rather than colleges. The school was moved to its current location in 1922.
The Sisters of Charity of Our Lady of Mercy is a Roman Catholic religious institute founded by Bishop John England of the Diocese of Charleston in South Carolina, in 1829 as the Sisters of Our Lady of Mercy. In 1949 the word "Charity" was added to the congregation's name, in order to identify it more explicitly with others that follow the Rule of Life of St. Vincent de Paul. They came to serve throughout the Eastern United States. The members of the congregation use the postnominal initials of O.L.M.
Trinity Episcopal Church, now known as Trinity Episcopal Cathedral, is the first Episcopal and the oldest surviving sanctuary in Columbia, South Carolina. It is a Gothic Revival church that is modeled after York Minster in York, England. It was named to the National Register of Historic Places on February 24, 1971.
The Circular Congregational Church is a historic church building at 150 Meeting Street in Charleston, South Carolina, used by a congregation established in 1681. Its parish house, the Parish House of the Circular Congregational Church, is a highly significant Greek Revival architectural work by Robert Mills and is recognized as a U.S. National Historic Landmark.
Charles C. Wilson was an American architect in practice in Columbia, South Carolina, from 1896 until his death in 1933.
Alonzo Clifton McClennan was an African-American medical doctor who was the co-founder of the Charleston Hospital and Training School for Nurses in Charleston, South Carolina, established to provide for the education of black nurses, care of black patients, and hospital privileges for black doctors. It opened in 1897. McClennan had gone to medical school after being the second African American appointed as a midshipman to United States Naval Academy. He resigned in order to go directly into medicine. Graduating with medical and pharmacy degrees, he married and settled in Charleston, South Carolina, where he set up his medical practice.
Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, colloquially Mother Emanuel, is a church in Charleston, South Carolina, founded in 1817. It is the oldest AME church in the Southern United States; founded the previous year in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, AME was the first independent black denomination in the nation. Mother Emanuel has one of the oldest black congregations south of Baltimore.
Morris Brown was one of the founders of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, and its second presiding bishop. He founded Emanuel AME Church in his native Charleston, South Carolina. It was implicated in the slave uprising planned by Denmark Vesey, also of this church, and after that was suppressed, Brown was imprisoned for nearly a year. He was never convicted of a crime.
Lucy Hughes Brown was the first African-American woman physician licensed to practice in both North Carolina and South Carolina and the cofounder of a nursing school and hospital. Hughes Brown was also an activist and poet.
Westminster Presbyterian Church is in the Jefferson Park neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. Westminster Presbyterian Church is a member of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), the Synod of Southern California and Hawaii and Pacific Presbytery. The congregation, established in 1904, is one of the oldest African American Presbyterian churches in California and west of the Mississippi River.
