By Jessica Holdman | Reporter
It’s Tax Free Weekend in South Carolina! Enjoy zero sales tax on back-to-school items from clothing to computers. Check out our explainer to see how you can save.
“What we are seeing when we look at these pictures is African Americans the way they wanted to be seen and remembered” - Rachel Young, a historian at the Center for Civil Rights History and Research at the University of South Carolina on a newly digitized photo collection showing scenes of Black life in Columbia in the 1920s and ‘30s.
Portrait of young woman with bobbed hairstyle and floral print dress (Photo courtesy of USC libraries/Richard Samuel Roberts collection)
By Jessica Holdman
Nearly 6,000 historic pictures by photographer Richard Samuel Roberts of Columbia’s Black families and community, are all available free to the public online for the first time.
“I tell people that Richard Samuel Roberts was not simply a photographer, he was an artist and he was also a historian,” said Bobby Donaldson, executive director of the Center for Civil Rights History and Research at the University of South Carolina. “He understood that one of his assignments was to tell a complete history of African American life in Columbia and in South Carolina, and he knew that he was telling a story that was against the prevailing narrative and stereotypes surrounding Black people.”
MORE AT USC
Five Republicans seeking the GOP nomination for U.S. Senate in a special primary participate in the first televised debate Monday, Aug. 3, 2026, at the WIS-TV studio in Columbia. The five (left to right) are former Gov. Mark Sanford, U.S. Rep. Russell Fry, U.S. Rep. Ralph Norman, Sen. Darline Graham, and Upstate businessman Mark Lynch. (Screenshot of Gray Media’s livestream)
By Seanna Adcox
Questions about the war in Iran and candidates’ general willingness to buck President Donald Trump provided some of the biggest distinctions between Republicans on stage Monday asking South Carolinians to support their bid for U.S. Senate.
MORE ON THE US SENATE RACE
US Senate candidate asks judge to put him on special GOP primary ballot | Jessica Holdman
Dominion Energy is headquartered in Richmond, Virginia. (Photo by Parker Michels-Boyce for The Virginia Mercury)
By Jessica Holdman
South Carolina regulators are expected to make a decision within six months on whether to approve a utility mega merger valued at $67 billion.
IN COMMENTARY THIS WEEK...
SC needs an alternate route to less traffic and more housing | Luca Gattoni-Celli, a Mount Pleasant native and senior fellow at Foundation for Research on Equal Opportunity, a free market think tank dedicated to Americans' socioeconomic mobility
27 years after landmark ruling, people with disabilities still face neglect and death | Patricia D. Sanford, founder of MyWallyBot LLC, a South Carolina company building privacy-first safety technology for people who can't speak for themselves, and full-time caregiver for her son Walter, who is nonverbal and has been on South Carolina's disability waiver waiting lists since 2021
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