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 1890s Clear ×
Arthur Freed
1894 - 1973
Lewis Strauss
1896 - 1974
Burnet R. Maybank
1899 - 1954
Octavus Roy Cohen
1891 - 1959
Septima Poinsette Clark
1898 - 1987
Anita Pollitzer
1894 - 1975
Ainsworth O'Brien-Moore
1897 - 1936
Josephine Pinckney
1895 - 1957
Albert Simons
1890 - 1980
Harry Young (American football)
1893 - 1977
Elise Forrest Harleston
1891 - 1970
Charlie Whitehouse
1894 - 1960
Helen von Kolnitz Hyer
1896 - 1983
Barnwell R. Legge
1891 - 1949
Fritz Von Kolnitz
1893 - 1948
Bill Hall (pitcher)
1894 - 1947
Gertrude P. McBrown
1898 - 1989
Lottie Hightower
Born 1891
William Lawrence (Pianist)
1895 - 1981
Tom Williams (negro leagues)
1896 - 1937