A former graduate student's thesis paper sparked the process for a marker at the first home for Confederate soldiers.
"It's important to cherish the past and remember it.," Mark Lynn said.
On Sunday, more than a dozen people gathered at the corner of Bull St. and Confederate Ave., the former site of the Confederate Soldiers' Home.
Lynn found out 15 years ago he has a family connection.
"My Great-Great-Grand Uncle John D. Kelly of Richland County was in the inaugural class in the confederate home in 1909," Lynn said.
The marker came about from the work of Brian Dolphin, a former graduate student at USC who was figuring out what his thesis topic would be.
"I knew that a home operated here but never had any visual of it, in about December of 2013 when I was studying a different topic I came across a picture of the home," Dolphin said.
The Confederate Soldiers Home opened in 1909 and closed in 1957.
Dr. Thomas Brown with USC's History department was Dolphin's professor.
"The upkeep was getting to be kind of a daunting thing, then they decided the building was too dangerous to stay up and they demolished it in '63 and I think it's been a vacant lot ever since," Brown said.
The history of the Soldiers Home isn't just important to Confederate history, but to women.
"This was the first institution of any state institution that allowed women in to make the policy decisions on it," Dolphin said.
Brown believes this marker is important to every-day people getting to know Columbia's history.
"A lot of people walk around this neighborhood, I live in this neighborhood, I walk around this neighborhood. And here's a condensed version of his research that will reach a lot of people and become a part of their every day surroundings.," Brown said.
The marker was also sponsored by the Richland County Conservation Commission.
