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Waverly

Established shortly after the Civil War and incorporated into Columbia’s city limits in 1913, Waverly is listed as a Historic District on the National Register of Historic Places and is protected as an architectural conservation district by the City of Columbia. Bounded by Harden Street, Read Street, Millwood Avenue and Gervais Street, by the early twentieth century this neighborhood became known as a self-contained, self-sustaining black community featuring many middle- and upper- class African American residents, among whom were leaders within spiritual, business, academic and professional circles.

Waypoints (28)

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1600 Harden Street

1600 Harden Street

Benedict College

Named for benefactor Bathsheba Benedict

Benedict Institute
Founded 1870

Benedict College
Chartered 1894

 

  • Benedict College

  • nedict College homecoming float, circa 1955

  • College Hall, built in 1886.

The American Baptist Home Missionary Society founded the Benedict Institute in 1870 to educate freedmen and their descendants. It was named for Rhode Island philanthropist Bathsheba Benedict, who provided the $13,000 payment needed to purchase the eighty-acre Latta Plantation and who continued to support the institute with later gifts. Robert Latta's former residence became the college's first building. The school had an enrollment of more than one hundred students for most of the mid-1870s. Instruction began on the grammar-school level but soon expanded to include teacher training and a college preparatory course. It was rechartered as Benedict College, a liberal arts college, in 1894. 

Benedict College's early mission was to train teachers and preachers.The institution later focused solely on college students, providing African Americans access to higher education during Jim Crow segregation. Like its counterpart, Allen University, Benedict regularly hosted civil rights speakers, and its students were an integral part of the 1960s sit-ins and the major 1963 demonstration at the State House. 

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Historic Columbia

© 2023 Historic Columbia

Administrative Offices
1601 Richland Street
Columbia, SC 29201

Tours
All historic house and garden tours start at the Gift Shop at Robert Mills.
1616 Blanding Street
Columbia, SC 29201

Questions? Call (803) 252-7742.

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