Excerpt from Men of Mark in South Carolina Ideals of American Life, Vol. 1: A Collection of Biographies of Leading Men of the StateMen OF mark IN south carolina is not history but biography, biography, however, that is absolutely essential to the making of history. Its special purpose is to tell the story of the men who have attained some distinction in the complex life of the state, those who have builded better than they knew, and who have been regarded by an advisory board of fair-minded and accomplished men as worthy to be included among the builders of a great state. The unit of measurement adopted in their selection was not ancestral distinction, or great possessions, or political preferment, or social station, but individual achieve ment, so that in this work account is given of those who have lived to some purpose, whether in country district or populous community, whether in industrial enterprise or professional occupation.Naturally and unavoidably, the character of its citizenship is in¿uenced largely by the history of the state. The self-reliance of the pioneers who redeemed this territory from the wilderness, their patience under suffering, their complete mastery of adverse and apparently hopeless conditions in the beginning of things, their genius for government, their military prowess, their purity of life, their loyalty to principle and their simple faith in the eternal verities, have set their seal indelibly upon the life and character of the state. In the many revolutions, political, mili tary and social, through which South Carolina has passed since the first settlement of the French colony under Ribault at Port Royal in 1664, its people have remained steadfast to a remarkable degree in their loyalty to principle. There have been many and sore dissensions among them at times, changes in government and political forms, invasions by hostile and predatory enemies, great depressions in commercial and industrial activities, and regularly recurring periods of political irresponsibility, but out of all these af¿ictions the state has been delivered by the inherent virtue of its people. From the Founders, with their high conceptions of obedience to constituted authority, of fidelity to the family, of faith in God, the state has taken its character. Its part in resistance to British tyranny and in the making of the Republic.About the PublisherForgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.comThis book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully, any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.