"Commissioners' Oak"
Columbia, Richland County, South Carolina
Marker Inscription
In April 1786 Alexander Gillon, Henry Pendleton, Richard Winn, Richard Hampton, and Thomas Taylor, Commissioners appointed to lay out Columbia, are said to have met under an oak which grew near here.
The Story
In 1786, South Carolina moved its seat of government inland from coastal Charleston to a more central spot on the Congaree River, creating one of the young nation's first planned capital cities. The five commissioners named here were charged with surveying and laying out that new town on a broad grid of wide streets—and tradition holds they gathered in the shade of a great oak to begin the work. The tree became a living landmark for the birthplace of Columbia, a capital built deliberately to knit together the low-country and the backcountry.
Why it matters
Columbia was among the earliest American cities purpose-built to serve as a capital, reflecting the new republic's confidence in planning government from the ground up and its push to give the growing interior a political voice.
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Related people
- · Alexander Gillon
- · Henry Pendleton
- · Richard Winn
- · Richard Hampton
- · Thomas Taylor
Related events
- · Founding of Columbia, South Carolina (1786)
Themes & tags
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