[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 94 (Monday, June 24, 1996)]
[Senate]
[Pages S6752-S6753]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    CLYDE M. DANGERFIELD, A TRIBUTE

  Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, I would like to say a few words about a

[[Page S6753]]

man from my home State who, in his work and his life, set an example 
for us all. Clyde M. Dangerfield died on June 19 at the age of 81. He 
served 35 years in the South Carolina House of Representatives, and was 
responsible for improving the lives of citizens all over Charleston 
County. His concern, persistence, and integrity made him one of the 
finest public servants South Carolina has known. He was a good friend, 
a credit to his county, and I can say, without exaggeration, that the 
State is a better place because of him. Mr. President, I ask to have 
printed in the Record two articles from Clyde Dangerfield's local 
paper, the Post and Courier.
  The articles follow:

               [From the Post and Courier, June 22, 1996]

                          Clyde M. Dangerfield

       When Clyde M. Dangerfield retired from the House of 
     Representatives in 1988, he was number one in seniority. It 
     had been 35 years since he first was appointed to fill a 
     vacancy in the Charleston County Legislative Delegation and 
     had gone on to win election 17 times. While his 24-year 
     chairmanship of the House Labor, Commerce and Industry 
     Committee set a longevity record, his chief interest was the 
     area's transportation system. Before his death this week, he 
     lived to see his major dreams realized.
       Relatively early in his public career, he was named 
     chairman of the Charleston County Legislative Delegation's 
     Roads and Bridges Committee. It became his prime focus and 
     highway improvements his chief cause. The scope of his work 
     was expanded when highway funding became keyed to long-range 
     regional transportation planning. Mr. Dangerfield was named 
     chairman of the Charleston Area Transportation Study (CHATS) 
     Policy Committee from its inception in the late 1960s until 
     he retired.
       His career spanned major changes in the South Carolina 
     political landscape, from the days when lawmakers were 
     elected countywide and Democrats were the only elected 
     officials, to the advent of the two-party system and single-
     member election districts. A long-time resident of the Isle 
     of Palms, his East Cooper area had become a Republican 
     stronghold before he stepped aside. Unlike many of his 
     colleagues who switched parties, he remained a Democrat and 
     withstood a strong Republican Challenge before he retired.
       Herbert U. Fielding credits Mr. Dangerfield with being part 
     of a coalition that helped him become, in 1970, the first 
     black legislator from Charleston since Reconstruction. After 
     that victory he remembers learning the legislative ropes from 
     Mr. Dangerfield in the rides back and forth to Columbia. ``He 
     taught most of us--all of us--me in particular.''
       Mr. Fielding also noted that Mr. Dangerfield never sought 
     the political center stage. In fact, Mr. Fielding remembered 
     that Mr. Dangerfield ``very seldom took the podium in the 
     House--he'd push me up.'' But few knew better than Mr. 
     Dangerfield how to get things done.
       Every member of the delegation who served with Mr. 
     Dangerfield can tell stories of being taken from one end of 
     the county to the other to check on requests for road 
     repavings, particularly in the days when county lawmakers had 
     the last word on such local requests. But he never lost sight 
     of the larger projects, particularly the James Island Bridge 
     and the Isle of Palms Connector, which were the source of 
     much delay and frustration. The ribbons were cut on both, and 
     the latter named in his honor several years before his death.
       It was Clyde Dangerfield's ability to work behind the 
     scenes and his persistence that were key to his success, 
     according to Robert B. Scarborough, the former highway 
     commissioner and legislator who was his closest ally. He can 
     recall more than one project now in place because Clyde 
     Dangerfield refused to give up.
       None is more notable than the $38 million, state-of-the-
     art, fixed-span bridge that bears his name and links the East 
     Cooper island communities to the mainland. It took Hurricane 
     Hugo to convince some island residents of the danger of 
     relying solely on one means of exit off the islands. When the 
     Clyde M. Dangerfield Bridge was dedicated, Isle of Palms 
     Mayor Carmen Bunch was quoted as saying, ``This opens a new 
     avenue to us all. We will never be kept from our homes 
     again.'' That is only one of many debts of gratitude this 
     community owes to Clyde M. Dangerfield's determined 
     leadership.
                                                                    ____


               [From the Post and Courier, June 23, 1996]

                 Dangerfield: A Life of Quiet Integrity

                           (By Elsa McDowell)

       Somewhere on the bridge that bears his name, Clyde 
     Dangerfield's heart beat its last on Wednesday.
       The connector that he had envisioned as a lifeline to the 
     mainland for the Isle of Palms and Sullivan's Island wasn't 
     short enough to get his 81-year-old heart to the hospital 
     before full cardiac arrest.
       Minutes before, he had finished his daily swim in the pool 
     behind his Isle of Palms house. He was climbing out of the 
     shallow end when he called to his wife Betty.
       He couldn't breathe.
       It was a scene Rep. Clyde Dangerfield might have described 
     in his years campaigning for the connector.
       He'd have said it plainly, an honest reflection of his 
     concern: Without a connector, someone on the Isle of Palms 
     suffering from severe heart failure wouldn't stand a chance. 
     With it, he might.
       Clyde Dangerfield Jr.'s voice catches at the image. His 
     father worked hard for the connector--much the same way he 
     worked for poor people in rural Charleston County.
       ``I remember when I was 8 or 9. On Sundays, he would say, 
     `Come on, son, Let's go check on some roads.' ''


                            roads and roads

       Clyde Jr., pad and pen in hand, would climb on a pillow in 
     the front seat of the big green 1954 Chrysler and they would 
     head to the boonies. In 1953, Dangerfield was first elected 
     to serve the whole county and that's what he did.
       ``Daddy would give me odometer readings and I'd write them 
     down. Each county was given so many miles of roads and Daddy 
     wanted to make sure it was divided fairly.''
       When he came upon roads that needed paving, they made their 
     first stop: A country store.
       ``He'd walk in not knowing one of the 10 people sitting 
     there. He'd leave knowing all 10,'' Clyde says.
       He'd also leave with the name and address of the street's 
     unofficial ringleader--their next stop.
       ``Would you like this road paved?'' ``Of course.''
       Then he'd pull out some forms. Get signatures from everyone 
     on the street. He'd take care of it.
       Oh, one more thing. Include voter registration numbers.
       Clyde smiles. They didn't have to be registered; but 
     Dangerfield knew politics. He'd have new supporters and 
     citizens would have a voice in their government.
       Sure enough, rural voters helped send Dangerfield to the 
     House for 35 years. And since his death Wednesday, the stream 
     of mourners has included simple people who sign with an ``x'' 
     and government leaders who live in the headlines.
       Clyde Dangerfield Jr.'s immense pride in his father isn't 
     because of politics. It's not because he established and ran 
     Suburban Gas and Appliance Co.


                                the man

       Clyde says his father ``provided the definition for the 
     word `integrity.' Every night, his six children saw him get 
     on his knees and pray. I never heard him say a cuss word and 
     I never heard him raise his voice to my mother.''
       His son can't think of anyone who didn't like his father.
       It wouldn't be someone who was jealous. Clyde Dangerfield 
     didn't enjoy the limelight. He didn't seek headlines.
       It wouldn't be a political enemy. Clyde Dangerfield was a 
     Democrat, but embraced issues Republicans appreciate as well.
       ``He believed in negotiating,'' Clyde says. To him, there 
     was no such thing as a win-lose situation. It had to be win-
     win.
       It wouldn't be constituents. They'd have to know he was 
     trying to serve them.
       Dangerfield grew up hard. One of 10 children of a dirt 
     farmer in Oakley, he finished Berkeley County schools when he 
     was 21. He needed time off to tend crops.
       He was blind in his left eye because of a childhood 
     baseball accident. The horse-and-buggy ride to Charleston 
     took a day and a half. Too late.
       Dangerfield was moving slowly through Clemson--hog farming 
     for money--when the war started and he joined the Army.
       Afterward he moved to the Isle of Palms and got involved 
     right away. He was a founder of the First United Methodist 
     Church there.
       When his house caught fire, he had to rely on Sullivan's 
     Island firefighters for help. So in the 1950s, Dangerfield 
     helped establish a department for the Isle of Palms.
       And then there's his family. A wife, six children and 10 
     grandchildren who don't just think--they know--that Clyde 
     Dangerfield was all they love and respect.

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