“Gravetrotting” With My Charleston Students

Hurricane Florence caused the cancellation in September of two of my Monday night College of Charleston classes. Since 2015 I have taught a unique course called “Beyond the Grave: What Old Cemeteries Tell and Teach the Living.” Charleston, especially its Historic District that the CofC campus is part of, makes a great place for such a topic of study and exploration.

I had some fun with the class photo below. Go to the end of this post to see what I did with the picture in the fun (and free!) Kizoa video/slideshow platform.

So, last Monday with Hurricane Florence no longer a threat we had class again and had a lot to do to get back on track.

We took a walk to a pair of nearby old churches, each with small but interesting graveyards. In the above photos, we are at the Cathedral Church of St. Luke and St. Paul, an Episcopal church on Coming Street. 

 Students were tasked with taking photographs and identifying 10 different types of grave markers. These would include headstones, ledgers, obelisks, mausoleums, sarcophagi, pedestals, and others. 

 We also went a couple blocks to the graveyard at St. Patrick’s Catholic Church on Saint Philip St.  It was a nice evening for such an outing. I think it went really well and I look forward to seeing the students' blog posts. 

 Before going to the graveyards we had an excellent guest speaker.  Ruth Miller is a long time to Charleston historian, author and tour guide.  She is very knowledgeable about Charleston's rich and diverse religious heritage.  And she has written short books about several old and interesting Charleston graveyards. 

 I think it’s important for the students to hear and learn about how Charleston was unique in terms of welcoming many different religions in the years and decades since its founding in 1670. 

For more on Charleston’s religious history, click here. For more on Ruth Miller, go here. 

Kizoa production is next! 

Cathedral Church Graveyard Sept 2018