Institution: Avery Research Center for African American History and Culture

Miriam DeCosta Seabrook and Herbert U. Seabrook Papers, 1882-1995

This collection includes correspondence, certificates, photographs, and other materials related to Miriam DeCosta Seabrook’s education at Avery Institute and elsewhere, teaching career, and civic involvement; correspondence, speeches, and reports related to Dr. Herbert Seabrook, Sr.’s community and fraternal affiliations and to his medical career as a private practitioner and director of the Hospital and Training …


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Philip Simmons Collection

Philip Simmons (1912-2009) was an African American blacksmith and artisan specializing in the craft of ironwork in Charleston, South Carolina. Simmons spent seventy-seven years crafting utilitarian and ornamental ironwork. His work is recognized within the state of South Carolina, nationally, and internationally.  This collection, donated by the Philip Simmons Foundation, holds personal papers with photographs …


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Cleveland L. Sellers, Jr. Papers, 1934-2003

The Cleveland L. Sellers, Jr. Papers is comprised of papers relating to the Orangeburg Massacre, February 5-8, 1968. Included in the collection is a poem, a collection of Western Union telegrams, press releases, a fact sheet created by the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, flyers, photographs, and a resolution from the Student Legislative Council of the University …


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Lois Fries Collection

Donated by Dr. Lois Fries, these artifacts were collected in the early 1920s by Reverend Robert and Jennie Oberly. The Reverend and his wife were missionaries to Liberia for the United Lutheran Church.


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Lowcountry Fish and Shrimp Nets

Cast net fishing is a significant part of history in the South Carolina Lowcountry. Africans transported to the Lowcountry, later known as the Gullah people, brought with them skills in boating and fishing. Seafood was plentiful on the South Carolina coast and barrier islands (sea islands) and made up a large part of the diet, …


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Leo S. Carty Watercolor Print Collection

The Leo S. Carty Watercolor Print collection contains nine signed and number prints by Leo S. Carty (1931-2010). The primary focus of Carty’s paintings are the daily life of blacks in the Virgin Islands at the turn of the 20th century. Leo S. Carty (1931-2010) was born in Harlem, New York on April 17, 1931. …


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Keith and Charlotte Otterbein Collection

The Keith and Charlotte Otterbein collection contains straw objects obtained while doing ethnographic work in Nassau, Bahamas between 1959 and 1987. Many of the items in this collection were made by individual Bahamian craftswomen (also called “plaiters”) who maintained their independence in the straw industry, while four were sold in the Nassau straw market, thus …


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Katherine Nicklaus Collection

The Katherine Nicklaus Collection contains two female carved wooden masks whose origin was the Democratic Republic of the Congo (formerly known as Zaire).


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Joseph and Rachel Coards Photography Collection

The Coards Studio was a photography studio owned and operated by Joseph and Rachel Coards in Charleston, South Carolina. Coards photographed African American families and individuals in the studio and various events and groups outside of the studio, such as graduations, weddings, and other ceremonies. The studio, located at 78 Line Street, closed in the …


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Joseph A. Towles Artifact Collection

African American anthropologist Joseph Allen Towles (1937-1988) met British anthropologist Colin Macmillan Turnbull (1924-1994) in 1959. The two exchanged marriage vows in 1960 and they lived together in an interracial, homosexual relationship until Towles’ death in 1988. Towles and Turnbull spent various periods of time in Africa, conducting fieldwork on the Mbuti, Mbo, and Ik …


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