Creator: Harllee, Harry Lee, 1876-1952.
Collection number: 4773
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Abstract: Harry Lee Harllee was a naturalist, ornithologist, taxidermist, and founder of the Harllee Museum of Natural History in Florence, S.C. In 1927, he founded the Harllee Construction Company, also in Florence, S.C. In 1947, his nephew, Alexander McQueen Quattlebaum (1913-1987) joined the company as a partner, and it was renamed Harllee-Quattlebaum, Inc. The collection consists of 41 reels of silent, black and white, color and tinted 16-mm film, including both home movies and commercially released films. The home movies were shot, edited, and titled by Harry Lee Harllee. Subjects include members of the Harllee, Quattlebaum, Blackwell, and Dargan families; friends; former slaves; hunting and fishing scenes in North Carolina and South Carolina; Magnolia Plantation and Gardens in Charleston, S.C.; members of the Woodstone Hunting Club; and trips to Washington, D.C., the Florida Keys, and Elon College, N.C., in the late 1920s and early 1930s. Many of the films are extensively edited and contain numerous intertitles identifying people and places. Some also have identifying information written on paper inserts or on their boxes. The commercially released films are primarily short nature documentaries.
Repository: Southern Historical Collection
Collection Highlights: Several films contain images of African American men and women. Of particular note is Film F-4773/14, which has footage of two formerly enslaved men. One man is Oliver Pierce, formerly owned by Dr. Robert Harlee, and Mingo Jackson, formely owned by the Rogers Family. Both men are identified as being around one hundred years old.