Only months, days, hours, minutes, and seconds left until the year 2008.

As we give thanks for our many blessings, let us not forget that there are starving people in the world. Do you know that you can feed a hungry person a meal with no cost to you other than the click of your mouse? You may donate FREE food once EACH day! If you "right click" HERE, and open in a new window, you can immediately return to this page. PLEASE participate! DONATE DAILY!

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Did you know that 40% of the oxygen being breathed is produced by rainforests? Many of the persons we are trying to feed will be struggling to breathe if we continue to lose an estimated 2 acres of rainforest per second. At no cost to you, sponsors will pay to preserve the rainforest. All that you have to do is CLICK. You may only participate ONCE each day.

If your browser will not allow access via the Pineapple Fountain Applet, please click on this miniature of the fountain.

Charleston, SC was the setting for PORGY and BESS, the American opera by George and Ira Gershwin. The opera is based on the story, PORGY, by DuBose and Dorothy Heyward. It depicts tenement life among the GULLAHS living in Charleston's Cabbage (Catfish) Row at the turn of the century. The inspiration for the book and opera was Samuel "Porgy" Smalls, a physically disabled man who used a goat-drawn cart for mobility. Smalls is buried on James Island, one of several Sea Islands near Charleston. This page plays the beautiful lullaby,"Summertime" (Hush, little baby, don't you cry.").

GULLAHS are the direct descendents of enslaved Africans from the Rice Coast. They were brought to the Sea Islands specifically for their knowledge of the planting, cultivation, and harvesting of rice. A GULLAH legacy is the Sweetgrass Basket( once used as rice "fanners") which is woven of sweetgrass, pine needles, and bulrush, and bound with strips from the Palmetto tree. One of the oldest African art forms in America, they have continuously been made in Mt. Pleasant, SC (Hwy.17 North across the Cooper River Bridge) for more than 300 years. ( Charleston celebrated its TRICENTENNIAL in 1970, six years before the nation's 1976 BICENTENNIAL celebration.)To this day, along several miles of Highway 17, basketmakers sit beside makeshift wooden display stands where they "sew" their beautiful decorative creations and sell them to tourists.

In 1996, the U.S. Congress established a select number of National Heritage Areas. "The African American Coastal Trail" was one of the brochures published by the South Carolina National Heritage Corridor. To view a copy of the colorful guide, Touring the S.C. African-American Trail of Charleston, Colleton, and Dorchester Counties, which includes a photo of my Gullah Series I: Porgy and Bess Revisited quilt, click here. The brochure provides a "road map" of historic places to visit.