Tides of Time: Navigating 40 Years on Dataw Island
Our History Afternoon The history sessions, created to celebrate our 40th Anniversary, began at 1:00 PM and ran to 6:00 PM, including breaks. These were all held in the Dataw…
Our History Afternoon The history sessions, created to celebrate our 40th Anniversary, began at 1:00 PM and ran to 6:00 PM, including breaks. These were all held in the Dataw…
The music of the Antebellum Era expressed the feelings of the two classes of people on Sea Island Plantations: the white plantation owners and the enslaved people. Listen to their…
This issue featured an article about Victoria A. Smalls, a Gullah native of St. Helena Island. She is our guest speaker at the January 2024 Fireside Chat. This event, an…
It’s fascinating to trace the wild turkey’s journey from being domesticated by Native Americans a thousand years ago to its role in the antebellum era at Elizabeth and Berners Barnwell…
This Spring issue includes three compelling articles: one about the economic significance of Sea Island Cotton in the Lowcountry during the early 19th century and expansion attempts into the marshes,…
The DHF is proud that we have artifacts found on Datha Island in the early ALCOA days that date back thousands of years. For example, in the display on the southwest wall of the History & Learning Center is a Paleo Indian Point that dates to 10,000 B.C. However, many have explored our area over the centuries. I recently learned from a young lady in Massachusetts that Charles Upham Shepard found an older and much larger item on St Helena Island in the 1800s; an American mastodon (Mammoth americanum) from the late Pleistocene era! This intact skeleton, found next door, pushes back our knowledge of this area by several thousand years, to at least 12,000 B.C.
Water in motion is beautiful—most of the time. But once in a while, it grows from a rising tide into a boiling hurricane. Water indeed defines much of the character of our Lowcountry. It flushes and nurtures the marsh. Defines the borders of our island. And pushes us away when a hurricane approaches.Most of you reading this know about the beauty of the waters around Dataw. It’s a contributing reason I live here. The “beast face” of water is fortunately seen less often. This week I’m going to tell you about, by far, the most massive hurricane this area has ever experienced—the hurricane of 1893. And I’m going to tell you a little know story of Ting Sams Colquhoun’s ancestors that met their death in that hurricane.
This week’s theme is HEIRLOOMS. The Dataw Historic Foundation is fortunate because the Sams descendants have entrusted us with several family heirlooms. This week features the story of two other items donated to the Foundation, a green silk taffeta Victorian gown and a shawl circa 1860. Ginny Hall-Apicella and BIll Riski recently presented the history of the dress to our Dataw Island residents.
The Event Natasha Boyd, the author of Indigo Girl, was the guest speaker at the Dataw Historic Foundation Author’s Luncheon in early April organized by Rosemary Patterson, DHF Publicity…
The Dataw Historic Foundation engaged Colin Brooker (Brooker Architectural Design Consultants) and Benjie Morillo (Frederick and Frederick Architects) to conduct a drone survey of historic features around Datha Island, particularly…
Thursday, November 19, 1863, at about 3 PM, as the sun broke through the clouds, President Abraham Lincoln gave his two-minute address to the 15,000 gathered for the dedication of the National Cemetery at Gettysburg, PA. We’ve all read it, studied it, and seen it (on the wall at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C.) I’m going to discuss the Gettysburg Address in a moment. The most interesting part of his speech is often skimmed over, “..of the people, by the people, and for the people..” First, I thought a summary of the Sams family members who served in the Confederate States of America army would provide some interesting context for you.