Learn about the movers and shakers of the Civil Rights Movement in South Carolina and nationally in the United States.
Biographies are provided with permission from the exhibit "A More Convenient Season: Civil Rights in South Carolina, 1948-1968." Installed 2005 at the South Carolina State Museum, courtesy of Cecil Williams and the I.P. Stanback Museum.
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The son of educators Robert and Mabel Hughes Boulware, Harold Boulware attended Johnson C. Smith and Howard University Law School. After graduation he returned to South Carolina and established a...
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Harry Briggs was a World War II veteran. Briggs, a gas station attendant, and his wife, Eliza allowed Rev. DeLaine to use their home for people to sign the petition that became Briggs v Elliott...
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Harvey Gantt was born on January 14, 1943. On January 1963, Harvey Gantt of Charleston, South Carolina, became the first black student to enroll at Clemson College (now Clemson University). Gantt, at...
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In 1963, seventeen-year old Henri Monteith Treadwell was one of the first three black students - along with Robert Anderson and James Solomon - admitted under federal court action to the University of...
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Henry Smith, a victim of Orangeburg Massacre. Photo courtesy of Cecil Williams.
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In 1965 Mrs. Irene Williams, a home economics and family living teacher at Manchester High School, sued Sumter County School District 2. Despite a stellar record, the district refused to tell her why...
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Isaac “Ike” Williams was known as “Mr. NAACP.” for his many leadership roles in the organization. Williams was born in Charleston and has ten siblings. He was introduced to the NAACP as a youth. While...
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A life member of the NAACP, Brown served as local NAACP chapter president from 1953 to 1960. During his tenure the local membership increased from 100 to 1,000 persons. Locally, Brown focused on...
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A life member of the NAACP, Clyburn has actively worked to support the principles of inclusion upon which the organization was founded. The Sumter native and graduate of South Carolina State...
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At age 16, James T. McCain worked to register voters in Sumter in 1921. He continued his civil rights activity while he served as the southeastern region field secretary for Congress of Racial...