In 1902, students at what was then the Freeman-Marsh Normal School dug clay from the banks of Cooper’s Run, shaped it into bricks by hand, fired them in a kiln on campus, and built Old Main. More than a century later, a new exhibit in the Heritage Center tells their story.
“Made by Our Hands: The Brickmakers of 1902” opened this summer in the first-floor gallery of Old Main. The exhibit features original bricks still bearing students’ fingerprints, rare photographs, a recreated brick mold, and letters written by students to their families.
Every time I walk through Old Main, I touch the walls. Those are my great-great-grandfather’s fingerprints. Now everyone who visits will know his name.
— Bernice Gadsden-Pryor, descendant of brickmaker Isaiah Gadsden
Built with descendants
Curator Elijah Gadsden spent two years tracing the families of the roughly 80 student brickmakers. More than 40 descendant families contributed photographs, oral histories, and heirlooms. A wall of names lists every known brickmaker, with room to add more as research continues.
The exhibit also tells the story of Old Main’s survival through Hurricane Hugo in 1989 and its careful restoration in 1992, when masons used salvaged original bricks wherever possible.
The Heritage Center is free and open to the public Tuesday through Saturday. Guided “Bricks & Belonging” walking tours are offered on select Saturdays throughout the fall.