Loewe, Geneva L., 1997

The collection consists of four oral histories conducted by Alada Shinault-Small between May and November 1997 for graduate history course at the University of Charleston/The Citadel, as well as her analysis of their importance and histories of the geographical areas they represent and photographs relating to the interviews. The African American women she interviewed were Mrs. Wilhelmina Gaillard of Liberty Hill, North Charleston; Mrs. Geneva Lena Loewe of Awendaw; Mrs. Marian Batchelor Shinault of Charleston, and Mrs. Carolyn Prioleau White of James Island. Ranging in ages from 60 to 82, the women discuss education, religion, their upbringing, home remedies, segregation, superstitions regarding death, and civil rights issues.

Specifically, Mrs. Gaillard mentions the Ku Klux Klan, Liberty Hill and its High School, Bonds-Wilson High School, Burke High School, Avery Normal Institute, St. Peter’s A.M.E. church and other topics. Mrs. Loewe mentions her grandmother, a midwife known as “Aunt Sarah”; intersex births, incest, death in childbirth, and disrespect for women. Mrs. Shinault discusses African American businesses in Charleston, vendors, ice houses, animals, teaching, Immaculate Conception High School, Simons Elementary, Simonton Elementary, Burke High School, Avery Normal Institute, passing for white on the train to Columbia, SC, and the 1969 Charleston Hospital Workers Strike. Mrs. White discusses the Old Roper hospital, her Zulu name, the area around the Medical University of South Carolina, Simonton School, Avery Normal Institute, home remedies, the Ku Klux Klan, Old Wallingford Presbyterian Church, McLeod Plantation, Gullah stories, corner grocery stores, Ferguson Village, etc.