State’s literary leaders inducted into hall of fame at USCA

USCA’s Writer-in-Residence Dr. Andrew Geyer and Professor Emeritus Dr. Tom Mack shared master of ceremonies duties during the 2026 South Carolina Academy of Authors Literary Hall of Fame induction events. 

“The SCAA selects new inductees whose works have been judged culturally important,” Geyer said.  

“Each inductee, whether living or deceased, has added to South Carolina’s literary legacy by illuminating some aspect of South Carolina culture and gaining a reputation that transcends the borders of our state.” 

The four honorees gave a reading on the Etherredge Center Main Stage on March 20. Claudia Smith Brinson, Dinah Johnson, Jenks Farmer and J. Drew Lanham were formally inducted into the SCAA Hall of Fame during a gala the next night. The sold-out event included dinner followed by the induction ceremony. Members of the SCAA Board of Governors highlighted the accomplishments and contributions of the new members, who gave acceptance speeches. 

“All four new members of the SCAA Literary Hall of Fame were frankly marvelous on both nights,” Geyer said. 

More than 200 guests attended the weekend’s events, including many literary figures from across the state of South Carolina. 

Founded in 1986, the SCAA has inducted more than 100 authors into the state’s literary hall of fame.  

2026 South Carolina Academy of Authors Hall of Fame Inductees 

Claudia Smith Brinson worked as a journalist for more than 30 years in Florida, Greece and South Carolina. She was a national columnist and writing coach for Knight-Ridder when the former newspaper chain owned The State in Columbia, South Carolina. Her reporting at The State won more than three dozen state and regional awards. Brinson was the first person to win Knight Ridder’s Award of Excellence twice and a member of the newspaper team whose Hurricane Hugo coverage was a Pulitzer finalist. Brinson published essays in national women’s magazines, and her short fiction awards include the O. Henry, as well as recognition by the National League of Pen Women and Iowa Woman literary journal. For almost 20 years, Brinson also taught once a semester either a journalism, nonfiction or short fiction course at the University of South Carolina. From 2006 to 2016, she taught writing, literature, and media courses at Columbia College. She developed and directed the college’s Writing for Print and Digital Media major and its media internship program. Brinson is the author of two major civil rights volumes: “Stories of Struggle” (2020) and “Injustice in Focus: The Civil Rights Photography of Cecil Williams” (2024). 

Augustus Jenkins “Jenks” Farmer brought a vision to life while creating the two largest botanical gardens in South Carolina. Born and raised on a rural farm, he left at 18 to travel and study around the world. But as an adult, Jenks returned to build gardens, write, and inspire plant lovers in his home state. Although he holds degrees in plant science and museum sciences, Jenks most values lessons from self-taught gardeners. He has written five books, including “Deep-Rooted Wisdom: Skills and Stories from Generations of Gardeners” (2014), “Funky Little Flower Farm” (2019), “Crinum: Unearthing the History and Culture of the Biggest Bulbs in the World (2022),” “Garden Disrupters: The Rebel Misfits Who Turned Southern Horticulture on Its Head” (2023), and “Secrets of Southern Gardening” (2025). He has also written many professional articles and travelled the lecture circuit, giving lively and thought-provoking presentations to organizations ranging from the Smithsonian and the North Carolina State Museum to his grandmother’s Allendale Ladies Afternoon Reading Club. Farmer, a 10th-generation South Carolinian, and his husband Tom now design creative private gardens and run a pioneering mail-order nursery in Beech Island specializing in the world's biggest bulbs. 

Under her penname Dinah Johnson, Dr. Dianne Johnson-Feelings has written 10 books for children, all celebrating African American culture and community. This authorial trajectory is not surprising since the history of African American children’s literature was the subject of her doctoral dissertation at Yale University. Her first children’s book, “All Around Town: The Photographs of Richard Samuel Roberts,” was published in 1998. “Hair Dance,” a 2008 Bank Street Best Children’s Book of the Year, focused on different African American hairstyles. In 2023, her book “H Is for Harlem” was named a Boston Globe Horn Book Honor Awardee; and the same year another of her books, “Indigo Dreaming,” was chosen to represent South Carolina in the Library of Congress’s Great Reads from Great Places program. As a professor at the University of South Carolina, Dr. Dianne Johnson-Feelings studies, teaches, and writes about Black children’s literature and its history. She edited “The Best of the Brownies Book” (1996), a collection of writings and artwork from an influential 1920s Black children’s magazine. Without her research, that particular Harlem Renaissance-era publication would be forgotten. Her important work continues. An upcoming book entitled “Black Barbie: The Story of Kitty Black Perkins,” tells the story of a Black woman from Spartanburg who worked as the head clothing designer for Mattel/Barbie dolls for 28 years. 

 A native of Edgefield, South Carolina, J. Drew Lanham is a poet, memoirist, naturalist, playwright, professor, and a recipient of a 2022 MacArthur Fellowship “genius” grant. He is the author of “The Home Place: Memoirs of a Colored Man’s Love Affair with Nature” (2016), which received both the Reed Award from the Southern Environmental Law Center and the Southern Book Prize and was a finalist for the John Burroughs Medal. Additionally, he is the author of “Sparrow Envy: A Field Guide to Birds and Lesser Beasts” (2021) and “Joy is the Justice We Give Ourselves” (2024). A nonfiction book, “Range Maps: Birds, Blackness and Loving Nature Between the Two,” is forthcoming from Farrar Strauss and Giroux. Lanham is the Poet Laureate of Edgefield County and a Distinguished Professor of Wildlife Ecology and master teacher at Clemson University. 

 

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