ARC-OH. Avery Research Center Oral History Collections

Abstract The Avery Research Center Averyite oral histories collection brings together individual oral histories conducted by Avery Research Center employees with Averyites (students, graduates, teachers, and descendants) to discuss their time at the Avery Normal Institute and their professional and personal lives after they attended the school. A handful of oral histories with Averyites that were donated to the Avery Research Center, but not conducted by Avery Research Center employees, are also...

Abstract The East Side Oral History Project collection contains three oral history interviews conducted by Elizabeth Alston as part of the research process for the Charleston Museum Leaflet Number 30, Between the Tracks: The Heritage of Charleston’s East Side Community. Included in the collection are transcripts of the oral histories conducted with Lorraine Fordham, Frances Mack, and Phillip Simmons. In their interviews, interviewees discuss growing up on the East...

Abstract The Director's Cut Oral History Project is a series of six video oral history interviews recorded in 2025 with current and former living directors of the Avery Research Center for African American History and Culture. Participants discuss a wide variety of topics including their professional lives, what brought them to Avery, accomplishments and challenges from their tenure, the role the Avery Institute of Afro-American History and Culture and Averyites from the Avery Normal Institute played...

Abstract The South Carolina Black Legislators Oral History Project contains seven oral histories conducted by the Avery Research Center. Participants discuss their family history, their interest in politics, accomplishments during their political careers, and thoughts about the state of South Carolina politics and their political legacies. Interviewees include Rep. Alma Bryd, Sen. Herbert Fielding, Chief Justice Ernest Finney, Sen. Maggie Glover, Rep. Brenda Lee, Rep. David Mack III, Sen. McKinley...

Abstract The Jean Claude Bouffard Civil Rights interviews collection, 1982, contains five oral history interviews with Septima Clark, Mary Moultrie, and Bernice Robinson as well as recordings of lectures that Septima Clark and Thomas R. Waring, Jr. gave to Bouffard's College of Charleston class in the summer of 1982. Participants discuss a wide range of topics including their family history and upbringing, their involvement in the Civil Rights Movement and organizing, African American leaders during...

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The Guy and Candie Carawan Sea Island recordings, 1960-1969, collection contains field recordings and oral history interviews documenting Gullah Geechee life and culture in rural Johns Island. The recordings were created, first, during the Carawan's time assisting the Island's Citizenship School and, later, when they lived on the Island from 1963 to 1965. The collection consists of reel-to-reel tapes, audiocassettes, and transcripts.

Abstract The William Smyth audio collection, 1985-1994, contains ten oral histories, conducted by William Smyth, and eight music recordings. The oral history participants discuss life in the Charleston area during the 1950s with specific focus given to the Civil Rights Movement and segregation. The music recordings include Gullah Geechee artists from the Lowcountry such as Ron and Natalie Diase (Beaufort), the Brotherhood Gospel Singers (Mt. Pleasant), unidentified "Sea Island Singers," and a...

Abstract The Somebody Had to Do It (SHTDI) Project brought to Claflin University in 2008, under the auspices of the Jonathan Jasper Wright Institute for the Study of Southern African-American History, Culture and Policy. This initiative was designed as a multi-disciplinary research project to identify the “first children” who “sacrificed their youth” in implementing the Brown vs. Board of Education decision of 1954. After the creation of a database identifying the names,...

Abstract The South Carolina Voices of the Civil Rights Movement Conference collection documents the 1982 conference held by the Avery Institute of Afro-American History and Culture. The conference hosted community organizers and scholars to discuss the Civil Rights Movement in South Carolina with sessions on voting and political action, labor, education, the culture of the movement, the Highlander influence, the youth movement, civic and political action, and redress and protest. Oral histories were...

Abstract The Documenting the Arc Oral History Collection is a series of video oral history interviews conducted between fall 2021 and summer 2022 by Dr. Millicent Brown and Cedar Wolf Media using grant funds from the Gaylord and Dorothy Donnelley Foundation. The interviews document the experiences of activists, organizers, artists, clergy, journalists, and other community members who were members or affiliates of Black Lives Matter Charleston (2014-2018) and other local grassroots organizations in...