[MUSIC PLAYING]
NARRATOR 1: The South Carolina Hall of Fame
was founded in Myrtle Beach, in 1973,
to recognize and honor contemporary and past citizens
who have made outstanding contributions to South
Carolina's heritage, history, and progress.
LEONARD TODD: David Drake was an enslaved African-American
in Edgefield, South Carolina, during the first three
quarters of the 19th century.
He's known today for the magnificent pots
that he made, the size of the pots that he made.
And he wrote poems on some of his pots
while the clay was still damp.
This is important, because at that time,
it was a crime, really, to teach slaves to read or to write.
NARRATOR 2: The Edgefield district of South Carolina
was the center of a vibrant pottery
industry in the early 1800s.
The Landrum and Drake families ran a kiln at Pottersville,
just north of the town of Edgefield.
Dave the Potter was born into slavery in 1801
and was first owned by Harvey Drake.
Probably the guy who taught him how to make pots.
And the Drake family was a very forward-thinking household.
So it was probably in their household
that he learned to read and write.
NARRATOR 2: In South Carolina, before the Civil War,
it was against the law to teach a slave to read and write.
Nevertheless, Dave managed to become literate.
It was a life-changing event, one
that began to open the world and its mysteries to him.
Dave was a master potter.
And many of his stoneware creations
were huge, some holding 25 to 40 gallons.
Sometimes, at the stage of attaching the handles,
he inscribed his name, Dave, in the wet clay.
Soon, he was writing much more.
NARRATOR 3: "Put every bit all between surely
this Jar will hold 14."
"This noble Jar will hold 20.
Fill it with silver, then you'll have plenty."
LEONARD TODD: They are wonderful couplets, for the most part.
There is usually a kind of wit and humor to them.
For example, one that he wrote was "Oh the moon
and the stars, hard work to make big jars."
NARRATOR 2: In the 1830s, Dave worked for the Landrum family.
Sometime in the 1840s, he became the property of Louis Miles.
From then until the Civil War can be
considered Dave's golden age.
JUSTIN GUY: And that's when he does most of his work.
He was writing on-- regularly on jugs and on jars,
especially large jugs and jars.
If the pot was exceeding wide and had a nice shape,
then that was the one that he would bless, per se, with his--
with a thought or with--
or with a poem.
NARRATOR 3: "Dave belongs to Mr. Miles, wher
the oven bakes and the pot biles."
NARRATOR 2: After the war, Dave adopted the surname Drake
and continued to be known in Edgefield as a pottery turner.
He had lost or injured a leg, possibly
from a railroad accident.
And he needed help to make his pots.
Dave died sometime in the 1870s.
Pottery making is a grueling process,
which involves digging, grinding, liquefying,
filtering, drying, milling, turning, firing, and glazing.
LEONARD TODD: He was in such a terrible situation.
He had to make pots every day of his life.
I mean, it's drudgery, honestly.
And he turned it into something extremely creative.
And he managed to put his wit and his intelligence
into those jars.
JUSTIN GUY: I think a natural beauty evolves out of something
that's done repetitively.
Pottery, of course, is a repetitive process.
You would have to make thousands and thousands of pots.
There is just a grace that you acquire
when doing something over and over again,
I think a flair even.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
You look back in history, and you
see this guy in a time when it was illegal to teach a slave
to read and write.
And he wants to leave his mark on the world.
I mean, he was against the grain.
He was-- he was obviously very, very good as a potter.
But good and then talented and then bold,
to put them all together to make rather unique--
I mean, there's nothing else like this in the United States.
LEONARD TODD: And he left something
for us that we wonder at and we value and we appreciate.
That was the most dangerous part, was that he signed them.
There was no question about who wrote that poem, who
made that pot, who could read, who could write,
when it was not really the thing he was supposed to be doing.
And he made sure we knew his name.