50 Fun Facts About Charleston

Charleston, on the Ashley, Cooper and Wando rivers, is the largest city in which state?

It sits on a harbour formed by the Ashley, Cooper and Wando rivers; locals like to say the two big rivers meet there to form the Atlantic.

Charleston was founded in 1670 under what name, honouring the reigning English king?

The first site at Albemarle Point was abandoned in 1680 for the present peninsula, and by the 1690s it was the fifth-largest city in North America.

The first battle of the American Civil War was fought at which harbour stronghold?

Shore batteries under P. G. T. Beauregard opened fire on 12 April 1861; the garrison surrendered after 34 hours.

Which Union officer at Fort Sumter, later tied to baseball's origin myth, fired the first return shot in 1861?

He missed; the fort's shells had no fuses, so only solid iron balls could be fired back at the Confederate batteries.

Which Confederate vessel became the first submarine to sink a warship, off Charleston in 1864?

She sank the USS Housatonic and then went down with all eight crew; raised in 2000, she is displayed in North Charleston.

How many crewmen died in total across the three sinkings of the Confederate submarine Hunley?

She sank in a test run in August 1863, again in October with Horace Lawson Hunley aboard, and finally after her attack.

Rainbow Row on East Bay Street is a series of how many colourful historic houses?

The pastel colours came with restoration in the 1930s and 40s, after the block had decayed into a near-slum; it once fronted directly onto the Cooper River.

Charleston's 'Holy City' nickname is traditionally linked to what feature of its skyline?

Historians think the term was actually coined in the 20th century, possibly as a jab at Charlestonians' self-satisfaction.

What creole language and culture developed among enslaved Africans' descendants on the Sea Islands?

Rice planters paid premiums for captives from Africa's 'Rice Coast' who knew the crop; Gullah foodways gave the city Carolina Gold rice, okra and benne seeds.

Which Lowcountry speciality, finished with dry sherry, is named for a roe-carrying female crustacean?

A splash of dry sherry is added as it is plated; the city's other signatures include shrimp and grits and red rice.

Which Pulitzer-winning composer founded Charleston's late-spring arts festival in 1977 as a US twin of an Italian one?

He wanted an American counterpart to his Festival of Two Worlds in Spoleto, Italy, and picked Charleston for its wealth of churches and theatres.

Charleston's senior military academy was established in what year?

It grew out of an arsenal built after Denmark Vesey's thwarted 1822 uprising, and moved from Marion Square to the Ashley River in 1922.

Who was the first woman admitted to the Corps of Cadets at Charleston's military academy in 1995?

She withdrew within days after death threats; Nancy Mace, later a congresswoman, became the first female graduate in 1999.

Which local school, founded 1770, is the oldest municipal institution of higher learning in the US?

It is also the 13th-oldest institution of higher learning in the country and the oldest in South Carolina.

The Arthur Ravenel Jr. Bridge, opened in 2005 over the Cooper River, links Charleston with which town?

At opening it was the longest cable-stayed bridge in the Americas, replacing two of the country's most dangerous bridges.

Which category 4 hurricane came ashore at Charleston Harbor in September 1989?

Three-quarters of homes in the historic district were damaged; the storm caused over $2.8 billion in damage.

In a Charleston single house, where is the real front door?

The street-facing 'door' usually just opens onto the porch; the story that the houses were built narrow to dodge a frontage tax is a myth.

What are the side porches on Charleston houses called locally?

They are always on the door side, facing south or west, to catch breezes and block the harshest sun.

The Angel Oak on Johns Island is estimated to be how old?

Its longest branch stretches 187 feet and its shade covers 17,200 square feet; it is named after landowners Justus and Martha Angel, not celestial beings.

Mother Emanuel, the Charleston congregation attacked in 2015, holds what distinction?

Founded in 1817, it was razed after the Vesey plot, banned in 1834, and rebuilt; nine worshippers were murdered there in June 2015.

Denmark Vesey, who planned an 1822 uprising in Charleston, had bought his freedom with what?

He planned the revolt for Bastille Day and an escape to Haiti; the plot leaked and he was hanged on 2 July 1822.

Which pirate blockaded Charleston in May 1718, leaving only when given a chest of medicine?

Governor Robert Johnson paid up in medicine, not gold; the weak, corrupt government made the port a pirate favourite for decades.

Roughly what share of Africans enslaved in North America landed at Sullivan's Island off Charleston?

Gadsden's Wharf, built in 1767, later handled the trade directly on the Cooper River and could take six ships at a time.

Which tree's soft logs absorbed British cannonballs at Fort Sullivan in 1776, giving the state its emblem?

The fort was renamed for its commander, William Moultrie, and the victory is still celebrated as Carolina Day.

Which Seminole leader died as a prisoner at Fort Moultrie in 1838 and is buried at its gate?

The army held Native American prisoners at the fort for fifty years.

Charleston's surrender to the British on 12 May 1780 is described as what?

Sir Henry Clinton besieged the city with about 14,000 troops and 90 ships; the British then held it for over a year after Yorktown.

What magnitude was the great Charleston earthquake of 31 August 1886?

It was felt from Boston to Cuba, damaged 2,000 buildings and left the iron 'earthquake bolts' still visible on many houses.

A Charleston institution founded in 1773 in the Wraggborough neighbourhood claims what national first?

It did not open to the public until 1824; the Old Charleston Museum building burned down.

The original Dock Street playhouse, opened in 1736, was what?

It opened with Farquhar's The Recruiting Officer and hosted Flora, the first opera performed in America; the current theatre was built inside the old Planter's Hotel in the 1930s.

Kahal Kadosh Beth Elohim, founded in Charleston in 1749, is important in the history of which movement?

It is the fourth-oldest Jewish congregation in the continental US; as late as 1830 Charleston's Jewish community was North America's most prominent.

Which novel and later Gershwin opera were set among Charleston's Black dock community on 'Catfish Row'?

DuBose Heyward wrote it; he and George Gershwin spent the summer of 1934 at Folly Beach writing Porgy and Bess.

The Charleston dance craze was popularised by a 1923 James P. Johnson tune from which Broadway show?

Its rhythm traced back to the Geechee dances of Charleston's dock workers, which had also inspired Eubie Blake's 'Charleston Rag'.

Which Charleston children's home fielded a band that played inaugurations and appeared in Porgy on Broadway?

As many as five of its bands toured in the 1920s; the Heywards insisted the real band play itself on stage.

Boone Hall Plantation's famous Avenue of Oaks was planted by enslaved workers in which year?

The Horlbecks, who owned it then, also had enslaved workers make the bricks that built much of downtown Charleston; the estate later led the US in pecans.

Which Declaration signer's home was the Ashley River plantation with the butterfly lakes?

His father Henry, President of the First Continental Congress, laid out the gardens with their butterfly lakes.

The Charleston Tea Garden, on Wadmalaw Island, is owned by which tea company?

It sells its harvest as American Classic Tea; French botanist André Michaux first brought tea plants to the area in the late 1700s.

What is a joggling board, a fixture of Charleston porches?

Legend puts the first one at a plantation near Edgefield in the early 1800s, copied from a Scottish exercise device.

Charleston's growing technology sector has earned the city what nickname?

Boeing's aerospace plant and one of the country's busiest ports anchor the rest of the economy.

How do old-money Charlestonians, in the non-rhotic accent, say their city's name?

The traditional accent drops the r and stretches the first vowel; it is nonrhotic and heard mainly in older natives.

Charleston was the largest colonial city south of which other city?

Rice and indigo plantations made it the wealthiest city in the Thirteen Colonies; half its 11,000 residents in 1770 were enslaved.

Which 17-day Charleston arts festival was founded by an Italian composer?

Piccolo Spoleto runs alongside it with local performers; the Southeastern Wildlife Exposition is a separate February event.

Charleston, West Virginia, sits at the confluence of the Kanawha River and which other river?

It became West Virginia's permanent capital in 1885; Daniel Boone was one of its incorporating trustees in 1794.

Which frontiersman was a trustee at Charleston, West Virginia's 1794 incorporation and sat in the Virginia legislature?

He supposedly walked all the way to Richmond to take his seat.

What early industry, from brine wells drilled in 1806, first made Charleston, West Virginia rich?

Neighbouring Kanawha Salines became the world's top salt producer; coal and the first natural gas well came later.

Charleston's first planned settlement followed a 'Grand Model' drawn up by which philosopher?

It made Charles Town the first comprehensively planned town in the Thirteen Colonies, though the Fundamental Constitutions were never ratified.

Charleston's original street plan was modelled on the capital of which Caribbean island?

The city is twinned with Speightstown; planters moved their operations, and the people they enslaved, from Barbados when sugar took over there.

What was the population of Charleston, SC at the 2020 census, roughly?

The metro area, taking in Berkeley, Charleston and Dorchester counties, is far larger; North Charleston blocks the city from growing up the peninsula.

On 9 January 1861, cadets from which Charleston school fired on the supply ship Star of the West?

The Union later confiscated the Citadel campus and used it as an army garrison for 17 years.

Charleston's state medical school holds what national rank among US medical schools by age?

It is the state's first medical school and largest medical university, anchoring a downtown medical district.

What did Charleston's 1739 Security Act require of every white man, even at church on Sundays?

The Stono Rebellion broke out before it fully took effect; drums were later banned because enslaved Africans used them to signal.