Building Community through Stories of Our Past

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On February 11, 2024 at 2:00, Drayton Hall will host Just Sharing: Building Community through Stories of Our Past, a partnership project of South Carolina Humanities, Clemson University, and the University of South Carolina.

The aim of this community-centered project is to foster fellowship and create empathy through conversations about our shared past, present, and future.

This unique event will feature presentations from three historians who will share stories regarding the impacts of hate on society with the aim of facilitating discussion and giving attendees the opportunity to listen to and learn from one another. Our speakers will be Rhondda Thomas, Ph.D., of Clemson University; Jennifer Gunter, Ph.D., of the University of South Carolina; and George McDaniel, Ph.D., President of McDaniel Consulting, LLC.

Following the historians’ presentations, light refreshments will be served, and participants will be invited to share their own thoughts, experiences, and observations.

Just Sharing is a series of panel discussions in eleven communities across South Carolina funded by the National Endowment for Humanities Initiative “United We Stand: Connecting through Culture.” The in-person format will share difficult stories from the past regarding the impact of hate on society with the aim of inspiring community members to work toward shared goals. This is a donate-what-you-can event.

Register Here

Jennifer Gunter, Ph.D., Presenter, is a historian at the University of South Carolina and Director of the Collaborative on Race. She is a trained facilitator and mediator. She helps to foster honest dialogues in organizations and communities to increase community, respect, and belonging. In 2022, she was named a Racial Healing Practitioner Fellow with the W. K. Kellogg Foundation. She will present “How Racism Impacts Us All.”

Rhondda Thomas, Ph.D., Presenter, is Clemson University’s Calhoun Lemon Professor of Literature. She has published the award-winning Call My Name, Clemson: Documenting the Black Experience in an American University Community. She and community partners are developing a Mellon Foundation-funded Black Heritage Trail on campus and in Seneca and Clemson, South Carolina. She serves on the State Board of Review for the National Register of Historic Places. Dr. Thomas will present “‘Slavery a Positive Good?’: Resistance within the Enslaved Community at John C. Calhoun’s Fort Hill Plantation.”

George McDaniel, Ph.D., Presenter, is President of McDaniel Consulting, LLC, which provides strategic services in planning, fundraising, board development, education, and interpretation for museums and historical organizations. Previously, he was Executive Director of Drayton Hall from 1989-2015. He currently serves as Chairman of the Ashley Scenic River Advisory Council and Chairman of the Board of Trustees of Dorchester Trust Foundation. His most recent book, Drayton Hall Stories: A Place and Its People (2022), won the South Carolina Preservation Honor Award for preserving oral history.