This week’s Spotlight is on Carol Black. Born and raised in Colleton County her family has been residents for three generations. Black is the daughter of Judge John Black and Betty Black who was in the medical field and a long-time educator. Black grew up in a house on the corner of Wichman and Lemacks Streets and was the oldest of four children. She was a 1975 graduate of John C. Calhoun Academy and attended college and Law School at the University of South Carolina. Carol says, “I kind of followed in both my parents’ footsteps. They changed the kind of things they did over their work life. My mother went to Coker College and then was a medical technologist at the hospital in Walterboro. My father was also an attorney. He stopped practicing law when his long-time law partner died. He bought Breland Chevrolet, and it became Black Chevrolet Oldsmobile in the 1960’s. He had the dealership for five years until he did not want to do that anymore. He didn't like the way the cars were being made, so he sold it to his sales manager, Roger Odom. He did that for almost 30 years.” After working at the hospital, her mother became a third-grade teacher.
Black followed her father into law practice but really was influenced by the Perry Mason television show at that time. Black has a long resume practicing law, “You can look at my resume. I have switched from practicing law, then I worked for the attorney general's office. I worked for Bill Howell, I was his law clerk, and then I worked for the attorney general. I decided that I was more interested in business type of matters. I went to work for what was then Edens and Avant. It was one of the two largest commercial real estate firms in the state. I was the only woman sales broker from 1984 to 1988. I went back to practicing law in 1987.”
Black also was able to work in the movie industry. She adds, “I ended up working on a movie that they were shooting the 1991 film “Paradise” on Wadmalaw Island." The film stared Don Johnson and Melanie Griffith.” The movie work appealed to Black, and it sparked her interest. “I thought I'd like to do this, so I went to the South Carolina Film Commission and talked to them. I'd taken some film classes in college, and the film Commissioner said, “They’re getting ready to shoot a movie in Charleston, and you need to try to get a job on that. I had to get the lowliest job there, but it was the same people that produced "Driving Miss Daisy," so I had a first-rate cast. It was called “Rich in Love”.
After “Rich in Love” Black managed a film project in Maine and ultimately decided to move to Los Angeles to further her career in the film industry. Living in Los Angeles from 1993 until 2003, she found the movie industry is a very competitive business, and advancement takes a great deal of time. Realizing how much time it was going to take to break into the film industry, Black got a job at a corporate law firm, as a law clerk. Black adds, “I took the bar, and I passed the bar on the first try. It was the hardest thing ever did my life.” Before ultimately taking the job at the law firm, she shares “I worked at Warner Brothers for a short period of time because they merged with AOL and ended up working for Universal Studios. The pace was very fast. I really liked it, I worked on a Cohen Brothers movie, worked on "Sea Biscuit," and I ended up on “Van Helsing” with Hugh Jackman and Kate Beckinsale, it was the largest budgeted movie the studio had ever done.”
After several years in Los Angeles, Black came back to South Carolina to figure out the direction she wanted to take her career. She eventually settled in Washington DC. “I like living in a city because I like the variety of choices. I came up to Washington to stay with a college friend until she could move to Alexander, Virginia. I got very lucky I had a classmate in law school that lived across the street from the man who was the general counsel the House of Representatives. He sent my resume over, and I went and talked to the chief administrative officer who hired me, and it was the best job that I ever had. I was administrative counsel the house. We ran the business side of the house, because the house at that time had almost 11,000 employees. We did all the contracts, the leases, because the members all have their own district offices.”
After the election and the house flipped parties, Black moved back to California. “At the end of 2014 I moved back to Los Angeles, and I lived there for four years. I went back to work at Universal but ended up going to MGM for a short period of time and finally to a law firm that did the Amazon Studios.”
In 2016, Black saw a house for sale in Walterboro, deciding she wanted to retire in Walterboro. “I bought the house in the historic district. It was in terrible shape. I've been working on it since February 2016.” Black is still active in Virginia. “I’m on the historic Alexandria Resources Commission. We're not a board of architectural view. What we do is advise the city about large and smaller projects.”
I asked Black what she would like to see for Walterboro, she said, “I would like to see change in Walterboro. I'm so concerned about the apathy of most of the voters in Walterboro. I looked at all those precincts (in the recent election), I think maybe an average might have been 25% of the voters, and we had more people running for office. Colleton County has been growing, but Walterboro has not, and the reason is because the comparative affordability. I'm amazed at how much these smaller houses are selling for now. But I want more people to get involved.”
Black has a very busy schedule but does enjoy her free time. “I love movies, and I go to a lot of independent films. Charleston has a one movie theater. Columbia's got one. But this with all the streaming services, they don't really have as many. I like to hike. It's difficult to hike as much as South Carolina because humidity and the bugs. I like to travel. I would say travel is the most important thing in the world to me. I want to travel, and that's what I do.” She has recently traveled to Crete, she also likes Istanbul, Portugal, and Spain. She would really like to travel to Sicily. She adds, “I rent cars and drive around to see places.”
When asked what she would say to the youth of Walterboro, she said, “I would say, decide what you'd like to do, figure it out, and I would say, Bloom. You know this sounds hokey, but you know that you should bloom where you are planted. If Walterboro is where you like to be and you want to stay there full time, try to make your own opportunities, but try to see what you can do to contribute to Walterboro growing and expanding, and not rely on your elected officials to do it. People need to join more organization, join more groups, and you can do a lot more if you're doing with other people.
