A sampling of things to do at the SC Humanities Festival

A weekend of art, history and music is returning to Beaufort.

The S.C. Humanities Festival starts June 9 and is hosted by USC Beaufort Center for the Arts. The three-day festival includes lectures, tours of historical sites, art exhibits and musical performances throughout Beaufort County.

Beaufort is hosting the festival for the fifth time — the first since 2000. Beaufort Mayor Billy Keyserling is chairman of the festival’s committee.

The Humanities Festival started in Beaufort in 1993 and was held in the city the first three years. It has since moved to venues throughout the state.

Camden, Walterboro, Summerville and Sumter have hosted the festival in recent years.

In a news release, Keyserling said he hopes northern Beaufort County residents visit Bluffton and Hilton Head events and those south of the Broad River visit Beaufort.

“This is perhaps the first and largest collaboration of organizations working together to share our sense of place,” Keyserling said in the release. “We have a story to share with our visitors and our residents.”

Here is a sampling of things to do:

▪ Explore Reconstruction: Listen to the USCB history department’s three-part lecture on the period, tour the Beaufort History Museum’s Reconstruction exhibit, watch a trailer for a documentary on the Port Royal Experiment and watch a video of the history of Penn School at Penn Center.

▪ Learn about local art: Beaufort Arts Council will present “Beaufort Through the Artist’s Eyes,” a gallery showcasing local artists. The Santa Elena History Center will host a presentation called “The Art of Jacques Le Moyne,” recognizing the French artist who traveled to the New World during the16th century.

▪ Hole up in historic forts: Consider guided and self-guided tours of Fort Fremont on St. Helena Island. The St. Helena branch of the Beaufort County library also has a 100-square-foot diorama of the fort for viewing. USCB Center for the Arts will screen a short documentary on Fort Frederick, the 18th-century tabby structure in Port Royal. Visit and tour Fort Mitchel, the Civil War earthworks on Hilton Head Island’s Skull Creek.

This story was originally published June 2, 2016 at 12:24 PM with the headline "A sampling of things to do at the SC Humanities Festival."