Spot. Goat. Boopa. Preacher. Peatsy. Red.
Nicknames, including those of political figures of all stripes, once were commonplace, perhaps a reflection of a society that spent more time talking with each other than emailing, blogging and staring at smartphones.
These days, with what South Carolina novelist Josephine Humphreys calls the “gentrification of South Carolina politics,” political nicknames run a comparatively narrow gamut with the occasional, bland Chips and Treys.
From the history books come cool Revolutionary War nicknames like the “Swamp Fox” (Francis Marion) and “The Gamecock” (Thomas Sumter). Still in the headlines almost 100 years after his death is “Pitchfork” Ben Tillman, the white supremacist for whom the 1893 main building at Clemson University is named.
Tillman, a former South Carolina governor and U.S. senator, significantly shaped the state’s 1895 Jim Crow constitution under which the Palmetto State still operates. Students today want the building renamed.
“To those who understood Tillman as he wished to be understood, the nickname ‘Pitchfork Ben’ fit perfectly,” writes Stephen Kantrowitz in Ben Tillman and the Reconstruction of White Supremacy. “The image of the one-eyed farmer poking at his foes before a roaring crowd masks the origins, intentions, and achievements of Tillman’s life and career in just the way that Tillman himself desired.”
In a related manner came the politically-adopted sobriquet of Ellison D. “Cotton Ed” Smith (1864-1944), the U.S. senator from Lee County who reportedly got his nickname after saying, “Cotton is king and white is supreme.”
Some more recent nicknames are unprintable in family newspapers. But here are some that used to be bandied about a decade or two ago at political gatherings:
- James P. “Spot” Mozingo, a colorful orator from Darlington County who served in the House and Senate. He died in 1972.
- Caldwell “Red” Hinson, a legislator from the Lancaster area who spent 28 years in the House and Senate. Even in his latter days of service, you could spy a hit of red in his hair.
- Charles D. “Pug” Ravenel, a Charleston political newcomer in the 1970s who shook up Democratic politics in campaigns for governor and U.S. Senate. Ravenel, who lives in Charleston today, got his nickname after breaking his nose twice while playing baseball.
- Rita Louise Liddy “Peatsy” Hollings, the politically savvy wife of Ernest F. “Fritz” Hollings. Both nicknames arose in their childhood.
- Ann Yarborough “Tunky” Riley, wife of former Gov. and U.S. Secretary of Education Richard W. “Dick” Riley. Mrs. Riley, who passed away in 2008, was known from childhood by the Gullah word meaning “sweet little baby.”
Also in the General Assembly were John J. “Bubber” Snow of Hemingway, James P. “Preacher” Harrelson of Green Pond, Marion “Son” Kinon of Dillon, T. Allen “Snag” Legare Jr. of Charleston and “Cousin Arthur” Ravenel of Charleston. Other colorful nicknames of state leaders include Frederick Julian “Goat” Leamond of Charleston; F. Mitchell “Cussie” Johnson, a former College of Charleston board chair; and Albert “Fish” Simons Jr., a leading Charleston architect.
In Charleston when a relative mispronounced “beautiful” as “boopa,” lawyer and two-time political candidate Edward K. Pritchard Jr. got a nickname that endures today. Legal eagles still remember Julius B. Ness of Manning better as “Bubba” than his given name. In fact, he may be the only state leader who explained his nickname with another nickname.
“Bubba Ness used to say when people called him an S.O.B. that it stood for ‘Sweet Old Bubba,’” remembers Columbia consultant Mary Green, whose father went to law school with Ness.
Winthrop University political science professor John Holder says nicknames like Bubba, Red, Spot and Goat are going away because the South is losing its cultural uniqueness.
“We’re more like the rest of the country, which in general is a good thing, and less likely to have these kinds of idiosyncrasies,” he said. “I don’t know of politicians anywhere else in the country who have ever had nicknames like Spot and Boopa.”
Nicknames humanize people. It might not be such a bad thing if South Carolina’s leaders got some good — and printable — nicknames for a change.
We Can Do Better, South Carolina!