34.4348° N, 81.0284° W
CHARLESTON
Most Famous People Born in Charleston, United States
- Notable people
- 749
- Peak decade
- 1940s
- Median birth year
- 1920
- Most distinctive
- Baseball 4.5×
Charleston's profile is frozen in antebellum amber: an outsized Lawyer and Judge class built by the planter bar that dominated South Carolina politics from secession through Reconstruction, with an Officer bench propped up by the Citadel and the Confederate officer corps. The smaller, stranger note is the Novelist thread — Charleston Renaissance writers like DuBose Heyward, whose Porgy became the seed for American opera.
One face per decade — the most globally famous figure born in Charleston during each.
Notable Births by Decade
Click a decade to filter the list below. Peak: 1940s with 63 notable births.
What Charleston Is Known For
Click any row to filter the list of people below.
Politician is Charleston's biggest profession — 22% of all notables (166).
Charleston over-indexes on baseball — 4.5× the global rate.
Charleston under-produces writer — only 0.6× the global rate.
Profession Mix Over Time
Each band shows a profession family's share of Charleston's notable births by decade. Hover the chart for the breakdown at any decade.
- Politics & Law
- Sports
- Film & TV
- Music
- Writing
- Science
- Other
- Filtered to 1870s Clear ×
Charles Clary
1873 - 1931
William Robert Shepherd
1871 - 1934
Leigh Whipper
1876 - 1975
Richard S. Whaley
1874 - 1951
Louis George Gregory
1874 - 1951
Jane Keckley
1876 - 1963
William Haskell Coffin
1878 - 1941
William H. Danforth
1870 - 1955
Theodore A. Peyser
1873 - 1937
Alice Ravenel Huger Smith
1876 - 1958
Chris Smith (composer)
1879 - 1949
Stella F. Simon
1878 - 1973
Herbert L. Stone
1871 - 1955
John P. Grace
1874 - 1940
Ernest T. Eaton
1877 - 1957
David Hyer
1875 - 1942
Frank Trenholm Coffyn
1878 - 1960
Margaret Vale
Born 1878
Charles P. Snyder (admiral)
1879 - 1964
Sarah Lee Brown Fleming
1876 - 1963
Beatrice Ravenel
1870 - 1956
Tom Colcolough
1870 - 1919
Ed Kenna
1877 - 1912
Rosie Rosebraugh
1875 - 1930
Louise Hammond Willis Snead
1870 - 1958
Sarah Visanska
1870 - 1926
Cornelius C. White
1870 - 1940
Cecelia Cabaniss Saunders
1879 - 1966
Fannie Cobb Carter
1872 - 1973
Henry C. Kellers
1874 - 1954
Carlotta Freeman
1877 - 1954