What you don't know about Columbia's Reconstruction history. Tour shines a new light Bristow Marchant, The State (Columbia, S.C.) Apr. 27—COLUMBIA, S.C. — The Civil War dominates a lot of people's conceptions of South Carolina history. But a new tour in Columbia highlights what happened after: the Reconstruction era and the unprecedented advances it brought to Black South Carolinians. The Reconstructed historic tourism trail was put together by Historic Columbia and Experience Columbia SC to highlight eight capital city locations and 10 Columbia residents who had a major impact on the state that emerged from the war. Reconstruction is the period from 1865 to 1877 when the United States struggled to integrate a newly emancipated population of African Americans, who voted and held elected office for the first time in the Palmetto State — even as proponents of the old Confederacy sought to turn back the clock.