Grant Gilmore

Grant Gilmore served as a panelist on Palmetto Perspectives - The Rising Tide: Living with Water.

Richard Grant Gilmore III is a recognized leader in Heritage Management and Education whose work for more than 30 years spans professional NGO development, fundraising, strategic planning, university teaching, and architectural and archaeological research across the United States, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Saudi Arabia, and the Caribbean. He serves as Director of the Historic Preservation and Community Planning Program and holds the Addlestone Chair in Historic Preservation at the College of Charleston, where he also directed the graduate program in Community Planning, Policy, and Design for five years. He is a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London (FSA) and a Registered Professional Archaeologist (RPA).

Since 2016 Gilmore has served on the Board of Trustees of ICOMOS-USA , the foundation representing the United States in the UNESCO World Heritage program, and he has held additional roles in local and regional NGOs and governing bodies primarily focusing on African-descendant community organizations. 

His academic path began with BA and MA degrees from the College of William & Mary and early work with the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation’s Department of Archaeological Research. Fieldwork with Norman Barka led him to St. Eustatius—later the focus of his doctoral research at the Institute of Archaeology, University College London—examining the African Diaspora in the Atlantic World.

Gilmore co-edited the Encyclopedia of Caribbean Archaeology with Basil Reid and has authored book chapters, articles, and monographs for professional and public audiences. He founded and directed the St. Eustatius Center for Archaeological Research (2004–2011), training professional, student, and avocational volunteers in artifact analysis, excavation methods, and historical archaeology; through an appointment at Leiden University, he taught graduate courses in historical archaeology. His research explores slavery and its societal impacts, the origins of capitalism within Caribbean economies, religious sites, vernacular architecture, heritage management, historic preservation, and public archaeology. He also developed and managed the island’s archaeological GIS, mapping more than 1,000 known sites.

Specialties: Public archaeology; heritage management; progressive urban design; comparative colonial archaeology and architecture; artifact analyses (statistical, chemical, etc.); African Diaspora; Caribbean; GIS; colonial capitalism.