The ways in which South Carolinians have earned their livings, enriched themselves and the state, and provided essential goods and services to each other, the region, and the nation have varied over time and place, and are becoming increasingly diverse. The images collected together in this category do not make up the whole story. Users of this collection are urged to look also at the following section on transportation, and to use the search function for additional images that illustrate the agriculture, commerce and industry of South Carolina.
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Beginning in 1740, experiments by Eliza Lucas (who later married Charles Pinckney - see Charles Pinckney's Town House) led to the successful cultivation of indigo, the source of a rich blue dye so...
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The Columbia retail district, Main Street, around 1908. Courtesy of the South Caroliniana Library.
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The cotton textile industry became one of South Carolina's leading sources of income by the end of the 19th century, but it had its origins in two sets of related technological advances in the late...
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"A Birds-eye View of the Rock Hill Buggy Company." The brochure for which this engraving was drawn boasted around 1900: "This company was started here in 1886 with a little hand power plant and about...
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An African-American seaman waits patiently for the shrimp boat "Mary Pickford" to leave the Beaufort waterfront in the 1930s. Courtesy of the South Caroliniana Library.
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The Southerner on Pearl Street in Darlington is an example of the beginning of modern drive-in fast food businesses in South Carolina, photographed around 1958. Courtesy of the Darlington County...
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The Sumter Telephone Company was established in the town of Sumter in 1896 by C.T. Mason, and by 1900 it boasted in its advertising that it was "one of the largest and best equipped factories in the...
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The Wapoo Factory, on the Ashley River, employed 430 men and processed 60,000 tons of fertilizer a year in the 1880s. Courtesy of the South Caroliniana Library.
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The Orangeburg County cattle pasture had a good stand of pine timber in the background. The timber not only provided shade and protection; it was also a major agricultural crop in South Carolina...
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This sketch was a preliminary study for the Mullins Post Office mural painted by Lee Gatch in 1940, titled "Tobacco and Industry." Courtesy of the South Carolina State Museum.
