Black History Tour

With the growth of Mount Pleasant in recent years, it has become increasingly important to prioritize and pay special attention to the preservation and promotion of African-American

history and culture.

Some of these historical and cultural sites have been compiled into a driving tour.

Riverside Beach & White's Paradise

Riverside Beach, developed by the Cooper River Bridge Company, opened in 1930 as the first black beach in the area. It was sold to the County in 1941. The site featured a dance pavilion, boardwalk, bath house, playground and ball fields. Louis…

Scanlonville

In 1868, John Scanlon, a freedman, purchased 614 acres of the former Remley Plantation at auction for $6,100. He then founded the Charleston Land Company to provide land ownership to freed slaves. The tract was subdivided into a planned community…

Greenhill

In 1870, freedman Hardy Green purchased 30 acres of land along Mathis Ferry Road. The area was called Spark Hill, but was later named Greenhill by the Moultrie School District. Children walked several miles to Laing School, then in the Old Village of…

Sweetgrass Baskets

Coil baskets of native sweetgrass and pine needles sewn with strips of palmetto leaf have been displayed for sale on stands along Highway 17 since the 1930s. This craft, handed down in certain families since the 1700s, originally was used on…

Cook's Old Field Cemetery

This plantation cemetery predates the American Revolution. It was established by early members of the Hamlin, Hibben and Leland families. James Hibben (d. 1835), one of the founders of Mount Pleasant, is buried here. Generations of both white and…

Seaside

The earliest documented owner of the property known as Seaside was Thomas Whitesides. A plat shows the property included a main house, a barn, other outbuildings, and a row of four slave cabins. The land was divided among his five sons in the 1790s.…

Edmund Jenkins

Edmund Jenkins, an African-American veteran of the Civil War, was elected as a Town Marshal in Mount Pleasant and served from the 1890s until the late 1920s. He died on December 26, 1930. His gravestone is directly to the left of this marker. The…

Friendship AME Church

This church, founded during Reconstruction, has been at the same site since 1890. The first sanctuary serving this congregation was located on Hibben Street and built on a lot leased by the Town of Mount Pleasant in 1877. After moving here and…

Laing School

Laing School located here from 1868 to 1953 was founded in 1866 by Cornelia Hancock, a Quaker who had served as a nurse with the Union Army during the Civil War. First housed in Mount Pleasant Presbyterian Church, Laing Industrial School was named…

Mount Pleasant Home for Destitute Children

At this site in 1881, Abby Munro, a Quaker from Philadelphia, established a home for orphans, neglected, and destitute children. Funds to purchase and operate the home were solicited locally and from friends in the North. It was incorporated in 1883…

54th Massachusetts Regiment

The Whilden House served as Union headquarters after the fall of Mount Pleasant in February 1865. Among the occupying troops was the first black volunteer 54th Mass. regiment. Under the command of Colonel Robert Gould Shaw, this unit was made famous…