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Think of Camden, S.C., and the town's annual Carolina Cup steeplechase and Revolutionary War Park probably come to mind.
But USC history professor Robert Weyeneth and seven graduate students are setting their sights on something less visible: the history of African Americans in Camden.
"African Americans don't turn up much in the primary sources of what's been written about the history of Camden," said Weyeneth, co-director of USC's Public History Program. "In a lot of people's minds, the history of Camden seems to stop in 1780."
Weyeneth and his students are focusing this semester on the history of African Americans in Camden from the colonial period to the present. They plan to develop a public history report for the town, a map of Camden's African-American neighborhoods in 1941, and a list of recommendations for the town to consider for further exploration.
Located 32 miles east of Columbia, Camden is the state's oldest inland city and was occupied by the British during the Revolutionary War under General Lord Cornwallis.
During the 20th century, the town developed a thriving business district, parts of which were interspersed with black and white business owners. Weyeneth's students are using a 1941 city directory to assist in mapping out the town's African American neighborhoods. Like directories in most Southern towns of that era, the directory designated African-American residential and business addresses with a "C" for colored.
"So much of history is detective work, and the city directory is an example of that: a primary source that was published for one purpose but can be used today for another," Weyeneth said.
McKenzie Kubly, a master's student in public history, has enjoyed delving into the 1941 city directory "and working with people in Camden who remember the town back then."
Louis Venters, a Ph.D. candidate in history and one of two doctoral students in the class, has conducted several interviews with Camden residents.
"This has been extraordinarily valuable, putting flesh on the bones of what we're learning from the primary documents like the city directory," he said. "We're getting some good leads and good ideas for other archival research we can do.
"One man took us down memory lane, recalling what the business district looked like with a black-owned business here and a white-owned business a few doors down."
Venters also interviewed an African American who recalled taking a literacy test before the 1965 Voting Rights Act, which eliminated such requirements for voting registration.
"He had to read and explain a section of the state constitution before they would allow him to vote. He didn't have any trouble, but I wonder how many were denied the right to vote because of those tests," Venters said.
To map out the Camden business district, the students plan to consult Sanborn Co. fire maps, which provide detailed information about commercial building structures in thousands of towns across the country. The maps were sold to fire insurance companies but have become extraordinarily valuable to urban historians in recreating what business and residential districts looked like in years past.
"What I like about this is that it is a real-world project and the students have a real client," Weyeneth said. "At the end of the project, we might suggest that the town develop a walking or driving tour for an African American tourism promotion. Other possibilities might be a museum exhibit and a Web site."
2/06
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