My Blog:

My character-driven historical fiction grips readers' emotions and surprises them with unexpected twists. In Silk: Caroline's Story, the first installment of The Silk Trilogy, “The social realism of Jane Austen meets the Southern Gothic of Flannery O’Connor.” It's 1899 in the Lowcountry of South Carolina, and Caroline must choose between the town doctor and a good-natured farmer, all the while oblivious to a young sociopath who is not about to let this happen. Full of laughter and heartache—with a sinister thread—the next two generations of the family continue the trilogy in Tapestry: A Lowcountry Rapunzel and Homespun. Other novels are in the works, but I often feel more like blathering about my reading and writing than actually doing it, so I've opened this venue for sharing my thoughts with you—about books already written (by me and by others), those yet to come, and a few about life in general! Don't forget to sign up for my free newsletter on the right-hand sidebar.

Monday, October 10, 2022

Edwin Green's 'The Indians of South Carolina' is a Quick, Cheerful Read

Author Sophia Alexander
holding her comb-bound PDF copy
of Edwin Green's charming volume
about the natives of SC.

In honor of Indigenous People's Day, I thought I would share one of my favorite Native American resources. Being from South Carolina and seeing this as a description of some of my ancestors probably biases my opinion in favor of it just a little bit.

The Indians of South Carolina (1904) by Edwin L. Green is a quick, informative, cheery read. I’ve actually been through it at least three times since discovering it just a few years ago; I’m a slow reader, but it just takes a couple of hours to get through. Some of the bias of the time is present, but Green’s goodwill shines through nevertheless. He presents fascinating, perhaps idealized information about native lifestyles and some local Native American history. I don’t mind its simplicity a whit, but if you’re one of those who prefers scholarly, detailed, accurate textbooks, this might seem a bit childish for you. Sometimes simplified presentations actually help me to grasp whole concepts, and Green offers that here in a book that he wrote for ‘the boys of South Carolina’. I presume he wouldn’t be averse to you and I appreciating this slim volume, however!

Check it out if you’re interested in Native Americans of South Carolina, especially the Catawba. You’ll hear him mention that the boys were taught to swim before they could walk, that the women once wore dresses made of Spanish moss, that the babies were strapped to flat boards.  I happened to be wearing a large, silver crescent moon necklace when I was reading it this last time, so I was tickled when I came across a section saying that the young men would wear large, silver crescent moons hanging around their necks, too.

I originally checked Green’s 81-page book out from a library, but since then I’ve printed off a PDF (available online)—less than 25 sheets total, if you print out four of the book’s small pages to each single sheet. Practically a handout if you double-side it. I put mine in a comb binder. My printed copy is now full of highlights and the occasional comment, a favorite reference that I’ll continue returning to.

Here's a link to download it: 

https://archive.org/details/indianssouthcar00greegoog/page/n10/mode/2up

 

 

Posted by at

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)