Drayton Hall Awarded $100,000 National Park Service Grant to Expand Descendant-Led Documentation and Interpretation of African American History

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Drayton Hall Awarded $100,000 National Park Service Grant to Expand Descendant-Led Documentation and Interpretation of African American History

Three-year project will preserve oral histories, strengthen descendant engagement, and enhance the site’s primary visitor experience

CHARLESTON, S.C. – Drayton Hall Preservation Trust has been awarded a $100,000 African American Civil Rights Grant from the National Park Service, funded through the Historic Preservation Fund, to document, preserve, and share nearly 300 years of African American history at Drayton Hall, including stories of community leadership, resilience, civil rights, and self-determination.

The grant will support a three-year project, running from November 2026 through October 2029, that will expand oral history collection and preservation, strengthen collaboration with descendant communities, and enhance how African American history is presented within Drayton Hall’s primary visitor experience.

A National Historic Landmark, Drayton Hall has long been committed to understanding and interpreting the lives of all the people who shaped the site over more than three centuries. Through research, archaeology, descendant engagement, and public interpretation, Drayton Hall has worked to present a more complete and inclusive history. In recognition of that work, the organization received the 2020 Group/Organization Award from the South Carolina African American Heritage Commission and the WeGOJA Foundation for research and interpretation of the lives of the enslaved people who lived and worked at Drayton Hall.

This new project builds upon that foundation by partnering more deeply with descendant communities to preserve family and community stories, document experiences of civil rights and self-determination, and ensure that descendant perspectives play an even more visible and enduring role in how Drayton Hall’s history is interpreted and shared.

“History is most meaningful when it is grounded in both evidence and human experience. This project allows us to preserve firsthand accounts from descendant communities while continuing our work to present a fuller and more accurate understanding of Drayton Hall’s history.” Carter C. Hudgins, Ph.D., President & CEO

Central to the project is a privately funded reunion of descendant families connected to Drayton Hall. The gathering will provide an opportunity to record new oral history interviews withcommunity elders whose firsthand memories of twentieth-century life, segregation, community leadership, and the civil rights era represent invaluable historical resources. 

These stories will document not only the challenges African Americans faced, but also the ways individuals, families, and communities exercised agency, maintained cultural traditions, strengthened family ties, pursued opportunities, and shaped their own futures across generations. Many of these memories are at risk of being lost, making their preservation all the more urgent.

“This award allows DHPT to center the stories of people who pursued freedom and equality at Drayton Hall across generations, from enslaved men and women who challenged their bondage to African American families who built community here and claimed their rights into the 20th century. This project will connect people to that history of the site in a direct, lasting way.” -Amber Satterthwaite, Curator of Education and Museum Programs and grant project lead.

The project will also provide professional training and equipment for ethical oral history collection consistent with national standards. Newly recorded interviews, along with a backlog of previously collected oral histories, will be digitized, preserved, and curated as a permanent archive accessible for future generations of descendants, researchers, and the public.

Research findings, oral histories, and archaeological discoveries will be incorporated into an expanded visitor center exhibit that more fully reflects the experiences and contributions of African Americans connected to Drayton Hall. The project will transform the site’s historical timeline into a two-wall installation and replace outdated audio-visual technology with a flexible system that allows staff to continually integrate new research and community stories as they emerge.

By elevating descendant voices within its primary gallery, Drayton Hall seeks to deepen public understanding of the many people whose lives shaped the site and to present a richer, more nuanced, and more accurate account of American history.

Project milestones include descendant engagement and oral history collection by spring 2027, digitization and curation of new and legacy recordings, design and installation of the expanded exhibit timeline, and implementation of a new audio-visual interpretation system. All project activities are expected to be completed by November 2029.

The project’s beneficiaries include descendant families connected to Drayton Hall, particularly elders whose stories will be preserved and honored; scholars and researchers who will gain access to newly documented historical resources; and the thousands of visitors who come to Drayton Hall each year seeking a deeper understanding of the American experience.

About Drayton Hall

Drayton Hall Preservation Trust is a private nonprofit organization that preserves and interprets Drayton Hall, a site of the National Historic Preservation Trust, National Historic Landmark, and the oldest surviving unrestored plantation house open to the public in America. Through preservation, research, archaeology, education, and public engagement, Drayton Hall advances understanding of the many people whose lives and experiences shaped the site over nearly three centuries.