Dr. Mandi Barnard has been coordinating the Cemetery Team’s archival research objectives at Clemson Special Collections Library as we enter the preservation phase of our project. Dr. Barnard has identified collections and topics of interest to guide the Team’s summer research agenda. She has also been in the archives working through these materials to aid in the creation of a preservation plan for the cemetery.
Dr. Sara Collini, with the help of our Spring 2022 undergraduate research assistants Nolly Swan and Lucas DeBenedetti, has completed the visual history of the cemetery in ArcGIS. It will be publicly available soon. She has also been researching mentions of the cemetery in the collections of Student Affairs and the Athletic Department in the campus archives. She is investigating the full impact of Memorial Stadium construction projects on Cemetery Hill. Ground work, including grading and sloping of the land, occurred near the northern edge of the cemetery in the late 1950s, during a seating expansion project, and in the late 1970s for the construction of the south upper deck and new Press Road. In 1980, part of the eastern area of Cemetery Hill near the entrance on Williamson Road was leveled for a new IPTAY parking lot.
David Ingram, “Soccer Field Relocated; IPTAY Parking Expands,” The Tiger (Clemson, SC), April 4, 1980, 1. https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/tiger_newspaper/2402/
Dr. Rhondda Thomas has been investigating changes in the geographical landscape within Woodland Cemetery from the establishment of the college until the 1960s. She has also been researching the forced movement of Black wage workers into segregated neighborhoods on and off campus during this time. Dr. Thomas, Marjorie Campbell, project manager, and Shelby Henderson, member of the community engagement council, have also been interviewing candidates for a new genealogist position with the cemetery team who will help document family histories of people buried in modern graves in the cemetery and learn more about Black people who could be buried in unmarked graves in the African American Burial Ground.
In June, the cemetery team visited sites of historic plantations and cemeteries in the Experimental Forest on the Clemson University campus to learn more about the interconnected history of plantations in the area.
Marquise Drayton will be joining the project team on July 11, 2022 as our new Community Engagement Assistant. Born and raised in Georgetown, SC, he’s coming here from Charlotte, NC. His research interests include slave narratives, the Civil Rights Movement, the post- 1865 South, and Black students’ integration efforts at primarily white higher education institutions, like Clemson. Drayton earned his BA in African American Studies from UNC- Chapel Hill and his MA in History from Clemson University. He enjoys traveling, going to the movies, and watching sports. The project team is excited about the experience and enthusiasm that Drayton will bring to the project. Dr. Brian Stack has stepped off the project to begin a new job as a community college history instructor in Washington State.
Representatives from the cemetery project’s research and community engagement teams, as well as from the Legacy Council, attended Juneteenth celebrations in Clemson, Seneca, and Anderson on Saturday, June 18, 2022. This was the first time that the cemetery project was represented in all three cities at the same time. We shared information about the cemetery project and joined our local communities in celebrating this important day. The team also donated cemetery brochures and copies of Dr. Rhondda Thomas’s book Call My Name, Clemson to the Juneteenth MegaFest in Greenville, South Carolina. We will be working with local communities to plan a program for Juneteenth on the Clemson University campus next year.
Dr. Rhondda Thomas and Sally Mauldin continue to give cemetery tours to small groups. Dr. Thomas also met with the Clemson University’s Statewide Gravesite Committee to discuss community engagement initiatives for all burial grounds located on land owned by Clemson. Additionally, the group will be exploring opportunities for collaboration with the South Carolina Department of Archives and History to develop cemetery preservation and memorialization resources for the public.
The Woodland Cemetery and African American Burial Ground Historic Preservation Project seeks to tell the stories of the known and […]
By Dr. Rhondda Thomas, Calhoun Lemon Professor of Literature, Call My Name Faculty Director, and Coordinator of Research and Community […]
In this issue we provide information about the research symposium keynote speaker Kamau Sadiki of Diving with a Purpose, update […]