Women’s History Month honors the legacy and impact women have made on our state, nation, and world. Learn about South Carolinian women who have impacted their communities through literature, education, politics, athletics, and so much more. Visit the State Library to check out these resources and more on our Women’s History Month state documents display.
State Documents for Women's History Month
State Documents on Women's History
Unsung Heroines of the Carolina Frontier: A Curriculum Resource
This curriculum resource was developed by the South Carolina Department of Archives and History as part of a series of eight Document Packets to enhance the teaching of South Carolina history by making copies of significant documents available for classroom use. This resource, revised in 1997, presents four women pioneers of different ethnic background – Judith Lawson, an African American; Mary Musgrove Matthews Bosomworth of Creek and European descent; and Mary Gloud and Elizabeth Haig, both Europeans. The lives each of these women led in colonial South Carolina reflect the challenges posed by a fluid society and by cultures in transition. They also illustrate some of the tensions felt as European, African, and Native American cultures interacted on the Carolina “frontier”- a term used loosely to denote the process of European and African settlement in a Native American environment.
South Carolina Hall of Fame: Lucile Godbold, Athlete/Educator
Lucile “Miss Ludy” Godbold (1900-1981) of Estill, South Carolina was one of America’s first female Olympic champions and a pioneer of American women’s competitive athletics. A star athlete at Winthrop College, Godbold earned a spot on the United States track and field team in the First International Track Meet for Women at the women’s Olympic Games in Paris in 1922. Godbold broke the world record in the eight-pound shot put and secured two gold medals and second, third, and fourth place in other events. With Godbold on the team, the U.S. team place second in the Games. Upon her return to South Carolina in international acclaim, she became the director of physical education at Columbia College where she remained for 58 years. Godbold became the first woman elected into the South Carolina Athletic Hall of Fame in 1961, and in 2005, she was inducted into the South Carolina Hall of Fame.
South Carolina Women – Summer 1990, Volume 11 No. 2
South Carolina Women was a quarterly newsletter of the South Carolina Commission on Women. The Governor’s Commission on Women was established in 1971 by Governor John West to promote equal opportunity and improve the status of women I the state by identifying problems and recommending ways to eliminate discriminatory practices. The commission gained authority to receive and disburse grants and to disseminate materials on the rights, responsibilities, and status of women, such as A Legal Guide for Women (1975) which included information on citizenship, credit and finance, education, employment, health, marriage, divorce, parental rights, social security, and wills and estates. From 1987 to 1999, the work of the commission grew to include Women of Achievement awards and developing a Women’s History Month annual celebration. In 1999, the commission made domestic violence prevention, women’s health issues, and expanded female participation in government its new priorities. In 2003, the commission lost funding from the Office of the Governor. The Summer 1990 issue focused on women in politics in South Carolina and beyond.
Mary McLeod Bethune: Portrait Unveiling July 10, 1976. South Carolina State House
Mary McLeod Bethune (1875-1955) was born in Mayesville, South Carolina, the daughter and sister of formerly enslaved people. After discovering an interest in education, she attended Scotia Seminary in Concord, North Carolina before studying to be a missionary at Moody Bible Institute in Chicago. She taught in South Carolina and Georgia before going to Florida and establishing the Daytona Literacy and Industrial Training School for Negro Girls in 1904; today, her school has transformed into Bethune-Cookman University. In addition to being an educator, Mary McLeod Bethune was a civil rights activist and founded the National Council of Negro Women in 1935. She worked with Presidents Hebert Hoover and Franklin D. Roosevelt and was a consultant on the drawing up of the charter for the United Nations. During the American Revolution Bicentennial, a portrait of Bethune was unveiled at the South Carolina State House on her birthday, July 10th. This is a program from the unveiling with information about the portrait unveiling ceremony, a performance of Langston Hughes’ play Don’t You Want to Be Free? by the Benedict College Drama Club, and the Mary McLeod Bethune Bicentennial Recognition Dinner.
South Carolina Women of Achievement Awards Ceremony
The South Carolina Women of Achievement Awards was presented during Women’s History Month by the Governor’s Office Commission on Women, in celebration of women’s outstanding contributions to home, community, and state. The awards also served to identify women who served as role models for other women in the Palmetto state and to provide information to the lives of outstanding South Carolina women so that women’s history “in process” might be recorded. Hosted at the South Carolina State Museum on March 24, 1995, the seventh annual Women of Achievement Awards Ceremony honored eight South Carolinian women who were leaders in the spheres of education, business, politics, volunteerism, and mental health and disability community advocacy.
South Carolina Women: A Timeline
This publication gives a timeline of women in South Carolina from 1540, when the Queen of Cofitachiqui entertained Spanish conquistador Hernando DeSoto on the Wateree River, until 1995 when the timeline was published. Each page is full of familiar and less familiar names and achievements of South Carolina women and how they impacted the Palmetto State.
Upcoming Event
Author Michael G. Williams and Arcane Carolinas Volume 2
March 13, 2025, 6:00 PM
Michael will discuss Arcane Carolinas Volume 2 while also exploring some South Carolina holiday-themed ghost tales, an international tradition the State Library is excited to participate in. Michael uses library resources to explore folklore and all things eerie in the Carolinas.
