Copyright Charleston Post and Courier
Penn Center’s annual Heritage Days Celebration is a four-day affair focusing on St. Helena Island’s Gullah-Geechee culture and community. It’s said to be one of the longest running festivals in the Southeast, and the event’s parade has long been a centerpiece of the festivities. Controversy flared in 2024 when changes to the parade route left parade goers concerned for their safety. As the 41st annual Heritage Days parade steps off Nov. 8, it will follow the same route used last year, with an accommodation intended to allay the concerns of marchers and spectators. “Our fundamental focus is that we have to consider everyone’s safety. Period. We have to coordinate with the people who are involved with the community’s safety,” said David Mitchell, chair of the Penn Center Board of Trustees. Until 2024, traffic on U.S. Route 21/Sea Island Parkway was stopped in both directions for the duration of the parade. In 2024, parade marchers shared the Sea Island Parkway with automobile traffic, following a decision by the Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office to keep the busy roadway partially open during the parade. It was an unpopular decision, and dozens of residents gathered at a Beaufort County Council meeting a few weeks later to make sure that message was heard loud and clear. "The decision not to close the road to traffic threatened the safety of everyone in the parade. This was unacceptable,” said Deloris Pringle, who was at the time, the chair of the Penn Center Board of Trustees. Beaufort County Sheriff P.J. Tanner defended the decision as both safe and a necessity for the high-traffic thoroughfare. "This area has grown so much over the years," Tanner said. "It's not realistic to close the highway for hours.” While the parade route was only separated from traffic by a line of orange cones last year, cars will be parked in the median of U.S. Route 21 to form a barrier, offering an added layer of protection for those marching. The parade will start at 9 a.m. from intersection of Sea Island Parkway and Halifax Drive. It will proceed west, turning left onto Martin Luther King Jr. Drive and continuing south to the Penn Center. The westbound lane of Sea Island Parkway will remain open to auto traffic during the parade, with deputies and troopers from S.C. Highway Patrol managing two-way traffic in the single open lane of the roadway. Founded in 1862, the Penn School was one of the first schools established in the U.S. to educate formerly enslaved people. It operated until 1948, when the state took over responsibility for education. The Penn School transitioned into the Penn Center, which continued as a central resource for residents of St. Helena Island. Martin Luther King Jr. visited Penn Center five times in the 1960s, finding refuge there while also meeting and strategizing with other civil rights leaders of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. The annual Heritage Days Celebration has been held since 1981. The event was a successor to "Harvest Days," held yearly from the early 1900s until 1948, when Penn School closed. Since its inception, Penn Center’s Heritage Days Celebration has grown from a single-day event to four days of song, food, performances, seminars and more. Attendance numbers in recent years have topped 10,000.
