Ahead of Her Time in Yesteryear: Geraldyne Pierce Zimmerman Comes of Age in a Southern African American Family

Chapter 1. Ancestors: The Pierces and Tatnalls, 1860s–1910

Chapter 1 Ancestors: The Pierces and Tatnalls, 1860s–1910 Introducing Grandfather Pierce Franklin Pierce was born on July 18, 1845, in the small town of Cassatt, South Carolina, the free biracial son of a slave woman and her White plantation owner. At some point, he inherited about three to four hundred acres of farmland from his White father and became a successful farmer in Cassatt. In 1865 Pierce married Charlotte Davis, a Cherokee Indian also born in Cassatt in 1845. It is not known how they met, but this young couple eventually had twelve children, including baby James in 1875, who were all more “mestizo” than they were “mulatto.”1 Franklin and Charlotte Pierce were strict disciplinarians and believed in using the rod for whippings. Together they built a strong family unit that had close ties and was based on strong religious values. Hence it was not surprising when Franklin built a long table with benches so that their entire family could sit at the table together for meals and prayer.2 Franklin Pierce, a true patriarch, took care of his family and made decisions in the best interest of them. He worked extremely hard alongside his hired farmhands to sustain his productive farm. The family’s matriarch, Charlotte, also worked very hard cooking, cleaning, and tending to the children and other domestic matters. As the children grew older, each was instilled with the Pierce’s ethic of “hard work.” The Pierce boys eventually joined the hired help in working in the fields, while their sisters assisted their mother with the domestic duties. Young James Pierce, with his brothers, would get up early in the morning to work in the field all day, plowing the rows, planting 2 Ancestors: The Pierces and Tatnalls, 1860s–1910 corn and peas, and picking cotton. Very hungry, they would often pick and eat the raw peas to quench their appetites.3 Franklin Pierce, a very fair-skinned mulatto, benefited from his White ancestral heritage, both financially and socially. He inherited mass acres of land from his White father and was well respected in both the Black and White communities. Because of this respect, he had an unofficial political role serving as the liaison between the two communities during Reconstruction and post-Reconstruction South Carolina. To date, no data has been found to show that Franklin Pierce served formally in the state legislature, senate, or any other elected or appointed role in South Carolina politics.4 It is not known whether Franklin Pierce and his wife went to school anywhere . However, before the early 1900s, half of their twelve children had finished the nearby two-year school in Camden called Mather Academy. Northern White philanthropists and humanitarians who wanted to educate local African Americans founded the school in 1887. After finishing Mather Academy , the youngest daughter, Sarah, went on to attend South Carolina Agricultural and Mechanical College (later called South Carolina State A&M College) in Orangeburg, South Carolina.5 Orangeburg was home to South Carolina’s first African American higher education institution, Claflin College. Founded in 1869 by northern Methodist missionaries, Claflin was a private college that “emphasized the arts and intellectualism.” A few years later in 1872, the South Carolina General Assembly passed an act to grant money to further expand the school by adding an agricultural and mechanical component. The new component was called the South Carolina State Agricultural and Mechanical Institute and was now a part of Claflin; however, twenty-four years later the South Carolina General Assembly passed another act to separate the institute from Claflin. In 1896, the new, state-funded public college was called the South Carolina State Agricultural and Mechanical College, and its first two presidents, Thomas E. Miller of Beaufort and Robert Shaw Wilkinson of Charleston, were both welleducated African Americans from prominent Reconstruction families of free antebellum background. In the early 1900s, when Sarah entered South Carolina State Agricultural and Mechanical College, commonly called “State A&M,” both Claflin and State A&M were highly regarded institutions in the Black higher education community and their strongest support system came from Orangeburg’s Black elites, who played integral roles in the daily operations of the colleges.6 Sarah enrolled at State A&M at the same time another student, Benjamin Mays, attended. In fact, she became Mays’s first love, and while they were an exclusive couple in college, their amorous relationship did not flourish into 3 Introducing Grandfather Pierce marriage. Sarah graduated...