Episodes Located: RICHLAND, South Carolina in the 1890's

  1. Southern Railroad System Purchases the Carolina Midland
    date May 12, 1899map RICHLAND, South Carolinatags Agriculture, Economy, Migration/Transportation

    A newspaper in Barnwell, South Carolina reported in their May 11 edition that the Southern Railroad had purchased the Carolina Midland, a main road that cut across the state. The Railroad had recently purchased the South Carolina and the Georgia road. The Railroad intended to use this road to construct a direct line from Columbia, SC to Savannah, GA. Cities like Barnwell paid close attention to...

  2. The South Carolina Constitutional Convention of 1895
    date September 10, 1895 to December 4, 1895map RICHLAND, South Carolinatags Race-Relations

    In the 1892 gubernatorial election, Benjamin “Pitchfork' Tillman gathered much support from the growing number of poor farmers and was successfully re-elected, despite the fact that opposing candidates attempted to push blacks to the poles to vote against Tillman. Once his two year term as governor ended, Tillman was elected to the South Carolina State Senate in 1894. After having nearly...

  3. Black Ministers Gather in Columbia to form a Suffrage Committee
    date July 10, 1895map RICHLAND, South Carolinatags African-Americans, Race-Relations

    As racial tension mounted throughout the South, many black citizens felt that voting the only way that African-Americans could achieve racial equality. Although a few blacks could vote in South Carolina, many were unable to vote because they were chased away from the poles by whites, couldn't afford to pay the pole taxes, or didn't own enough property to be eligible to vote.
    In order to...

  4. The Rising Sun of White Supremacy in South Carolina
    date June 15, 1898map RICHLAND, South Carolinatags Education, Politics, Race-Relations

    In his Baccalaureate address give on June 15, 1898 at South Carolina College in Columbia, George Herbert Sass gave a speech to his fellow graduating classmates early in the morning as the sun rose over the ceremony, which began early to avoid the humid, southern heat. Sass addressed the changing times as he discussed how a person is unable to choose whether an act reflects character or was the result...

  5. Prohibition and Organized Crime in the 19th Century South
    date February 8, 1894map RICHLAND, South Carolinatags Crime/Violence, Law, Urban-Life/Boosterism

    As read in The Sentinel, a crowd of men had set up a whiskey store in the area of Glassy Mountain. With sufficient evidence to investigate the situation, Chief Constable Fant and his men made their way down to the anti-Prohibition display. In order to find the hidden whiskey, an undercover man had to buy the liquor; a man then went into the swamp to fetch the alcohol. According to the testimony...

  6. Cotton Growers Unite Over Deflation
    date September 27, 1898 to September 28, 1898map RICHLAND, South Carolinatags Agriculture, Economy, Politics

    In The State, a special address was made from a committee of the Cotton Growers' union of South Carolina to the cotton growers of the state. Immediately, the committee addresses exceedingly low prices of cotton of the time period and the further deflation to come. With prices...lower than they have ever been previously at the time, foreign speculators were holding off purchases to wait...

  7. Religion Spawns Murder in South Carolina
    date March 1, 1897map RICHLAND, South Carolinatags Church/Religious-Activity, Crime/Violence

    On the last day of February 1897, according to The State, John Yochum was shot and killed by a coworker from the Richland mill, Bryce McComb. When McComb, a young man not yet of age, approached Yochum, a man of 53, to reprimand him for his treatment of another worker, Owens, the elder retaliated with violence. Owens had approached a group of his coworkers asking them if they would have...