In aviation, a pilot checklist is an essential tool used to ensure flight safety, legal compliance, and airworthiness of the craft to be flown. The checklist exists thanks to a man named Ployer Peter Hill. Or, as South Carolina’s Carol McLaren knew him, “Uncle Ployer.”

On May 16, 2024, Shaheena Bennett was sworn in as the first Black female president of the South Carolina Bar Association. A month before, she and her colleague, Nekki Shutt, sat down with StoryCorps to talk about what led to that groundbreaking moment.

Beth DeHart and her son, Jonah DeHart-Thompson, have dedicated their lives to serving and improving South Carolina communities. From the moment Jonah was conceived in the hearts of his two mothers, it was their intention to show him he was not only special, but that every person was special and deserved to be loved and cared for, regardless of their background.

How different is life as a teenager from generation to generation? That’s what 15-year-old Daniel Brown sought to find out when he invited his grandfather, Steve Garris, to the StoryCorps studio to share what it was like growing up in a small southern town. Garris reflects on his youth, from misadventures to falling in love with the music that became the soundtrack to his life in Andrews, South Carolina.

Christine Currie and Jacelyn Arradaza met while working at the South Carolina Commission for Minority Affairs. In 2024, they sat down with StoryCorps to share some personal experiences that inspired them to bring a greater understanding of Asian history and culture into our nation’s schools.

Laura Tolliver Jefferson was a consequential figure among Columbia’s Little Camden, Arthurtown, and Taylors communities. During her lifetime, Jefferson was a strong advocate for literacy, civic engagement, and bringing essential systems like sidewalks, streetlights, water, and sewage access to her community. 

In 1967, Lee Cannon enlisted in the Air National Guard, where he served eight years as a navigator. In 2024, he sat down with his daughter, Leah, at StoryCorps to explain the unique nature of his job, and to fill in the gaps of a remarkable story he had once told her when she was a child.

The South Carolina Governor’s School for the Arts and Humanities first began as an idea by Virginia Uldrick, a well-known music teacher in Greenville, S.C. Educators Jennifer Thomas and Scott Gould recently joined StoryCorps to explain the mission of the school, and Uldrick’s standards of excellence for both her students and staff.

Able South Carolina's President & CEO Kimberly Tissot joins Vice President Mary Alex Kopp and Senior Director of Community Education, Dori Tempio, at StoryCorps to discuss their agency's core values and vision for true equity for people with disabilities.

According to the Urban Institute, nearly half of all families across the U.S. with children ages 3 and younger struggle to pay for diapers. Here in South Carolina, a young mom named Ayanna White found herself experiencing that struggle and wanted to find a way to not only help herself, but others as well who were in a similar situation.