The Humanities CouncilSC Board of Directors awarded $80,000 in Major Grants to 14 cultural organizations after a September 11, 2009 Board Meeting in Columbia.
The awards were selected through a competitive application and review process and are made possible by The Humanities CouncilSC and the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Funded projects include a documentary about a Civil Rights event in Rock Hill, an oral history and preservation project about the Catawba Indians of South Carolina, and a heritage music trail in Spartanburg, among many others. Matching community support for the 14 awarded projects totaled: $367,509.
A list of awarded grants is provided below:
Sponsoring Organization: Lee County Historical Society Project Title: Rotating Exhibits of Historical Photographs and Penny Post Cards Project Director: Bobbi Adams Awarded: $7,000; cost-share: $9,100 Lee County Historical Society will preserve a large number of historical documents, maps, photographs, and penny post cards that will be used to create a variety of interchangeable exhibits that will be displayed at the James House in Bishopville.
Sponsoring Organization: Carolina Lowcountry & Atlantic World Program, College of Charleston Project Title: Conference and Teacher's Workshop on 'Race, Labor, and Citizenship in the Post-Emancipation South' Project Director: Simon K. Lewis Awarded: $4,000; cost-share: $5,903 The Carolina Lowcountry & Atlantic World Program at the College of Charleston will host an international conference involving a number of partnering organizations, including National History Day, the National Park Service and several South Carolina universities. The conference will investigate “Race, Labor, and Citizenship in the Post-Emancipation South” and will take place March 11 - 13, 2010.
Sponsoring Organization: South Carolina Historical Society Project Title: "Voices of Secession:" An Exhibit of South Carolina in 1960 Project Director: Gloria Perla Awarded: $2,500; cost-share: $7,624 The South Carolina Historical Society will sponsor a multimedia exhibit project about secession in preparation for the sesquicentennial anniversary of the Civil War in December 2010. The project will include both a traditional exhibit installed at the SC Historical Society building in Charleston and a PowerPoint presentation with voiceovers that will made available to 8th grade history teachers statewide.
Sponsoring Organization: Morgan Allen Platt Foundation Project Title: 2nd Annual American Indian Expo Project Director: Laurine T. Charles Awarded: $6,000; cost-share: $22,257 The 2nd Annual American Indian Expo is a major historical and cultural event in Charleston for both students and the general public. The Expo will take place November 5th-7th, 2009 at Charles Towne Landing, with November 5th and 6th reserved for the approximately 2,500 K-12 students expected and November 7th open to the general public.
Sponsoring Organization: Rutherford County (NC) Arts Council Project Title: "Col. Gene Wyatt, the Story of a Music Maker" Documentary Project Director: Matthew McEnnerney Awarded: $5,000; cost-share: $9,275 The Rutherford County Arts Council in North Carolina will create a documentary that will feature the recently deceased South Carolina musician, Colonel Gene Wyatt. A Spartanburg native, Colonel Gene Wyatt is noted for having developed a unique music theory and for incorporating traditional folk music with classical composition.
Sponsoring Organization: University of South Carolina (USC Upstate) Project Title: Talkin' 'Bout South Carolina: Encouraging Language Diversity, Tolerance, and Inclusivity Project Director: David Marlow Awarded: $8,000; cost-share: $8,670 University of South Carolina Upstate plans a two-part linguistics project that will include both a curriculum component that will introduce lesson plans about linguistic diversity into social studies and language arts classrooms and a public component of four community discussion forums in Spartanburg, Lancaster/Rock Hill, Beaufort, and Columbia.
Sponsoring Organization: Beaufort Three Century Project at the Community Foundation of the Lowcountry Project Title: Beaufort Three Century Project 2010 Event Series Project Director: Deborah S. Johnson Awarded: $8,000; cost-share: $31,062 The Beaufort Three-Century Project will be a diverse series of events celebrating the 300th anniversary of the City of Beaufort. Events will take place throughout 2010 and include a historic lecture series, a historic tree event, a play, several oral history harvests, and book publication events.
Sponsoring Organization: Historic Columbia Foundation Project Title: People, Places, and Progress: Connecting Communities Through History Project Director: Robin Waites Awarded: $7,500; cost-share: $140,036 Historic Columbia Foundation will spearhead a multi-faceted initiative to record and promote the histories of six historic Columbia neighborhoods: Arsenal Hill, Old Shandon, Lower Waverly, Cottontown, Heathwood, and Hollywood/Rose Hill. Research about the neighborhoods will result in small exhibits placed in each historic neighborhood, self-guided tour brochures and web-based materials about each neighborhood, and a series of public programs.
Sponsoring Organization: Anderson University Project Title:Dr. Annie Dove Denmark, President of Anderson University, 1928-1953 Project Director: Deborah McEniry Awarded: $1,500; cost-share: $22,197 Anderson University will create a historical play about Dr. Annie Dove Denmark, President of Anderson University from 1928-1953, and the first female president of any South Carolina college. The play will be part of the celebration of Anderson University’s centennial in 2010-2011 and will be staged multiple times both in Anderson and around the state.
Sponsoring Organization: The University of South Carolina Project Title: The University of South Carolina and African American Research in the 21st Century Project Director: Daniel C. Littlefield Awarded: $6,000; cost-share: $15,432 The University of South Carolina will sponsor a major academic conference on the contemporary African American experience to take place March 24-26, 2010. The conference will help to announce the recent establishment of the “Institute for African American Research” at USC and will look at three main issues: education, public health, and immigration.
Sponsoring Organization: ETV Endowment of South Carolina Project Title: Carolina Stories: Jail, No Bail Project Director: Tim Coghill Awarded: $8,000; cost-share: $46,381 SCETV Rock Hill plans a 30-minute documentary about the Civil Rights event in Rock Hill involving the “Friendship Nine,” who staged a sit-in at a segregated lunch counter and later did not post bail as part of their non-violent protest. The documentary will be accompanied by educational materials on ETV’s Web site, knowitall.org, and a printed “road map” of South Carolina civil rights history to be distributed to teachers.
Sponsoring Organization: HubCulture, Inc. Project Title: The Spartanburg Music Trail Project Director: Betsy Teter Awarded: $5,000; cost-share: $30,352 HubCulture will spearhead the creation of public and interactive components of the Spartanburg Music Trail, a permanent heritage project in downtown Spartanburg that will highlight major musical figures from the Upstate. 12 six-foot signs highlighting 12 musical artists will be created and installed in a six-block area of downtown Spartanburg, and a parallel audio tour and interactive Web site will also be implemented.
Sponsoring Organization: EdVenture, Inc. Project Title: The Monkey King: A Journey to China Project Director: Susan Bonk Awarded: $5,000; cost-share: $8,720 EdVenture will sponsor a series of four public “festivals” to accompany the five-month tenure of the cultural exhibit The Monkey King: A Journey to China, which will be on display from January – May 2010. The festivals will take place monthly between February and May and will highlight some of the historical and cultural aspects of China: the Chinese New Year, Chinese sports, Chinese art, and Chinese literature and language.
Sponsoring Organization: University of South Carolina (USC Lancaster) Project Title: The USC Lancaster South Carolina Native American Oral History Project: The Catawba Project Director: Stephen Criswell Awarded: $6,500; cost-share: $10,500 USC Lancaster requests funds for an oral history collection and digitalization project to gather and preserve the stories and culture of the Catawba Indian tribe in the Lancaster area. Existing fragile oral histories will be digitized, and new oral histories will be collected. The oral histories will inform a series of public programs and minor exhibits that will take place in April 2010 during USC Lancaster’s Native American Studies Week.
The next major grant application deadline is January 6, 2010 for preliminary drafts. For more information about the projects listed above or about upcoming grant opportunities, please contact T.J. Wallace at 803-771-2477.
