April 21, 2017
In 1956 Bernard Baruch signed over all of Hobcaw Barony to his daughter, Belle. Belle died in 1964, leaving Hobcaw "for the purpose of teaching and/or research in forestry, marine biology, and the care and propagation of wild life and flora and fauna in South Carolina." Today the Belle W. Baruch Foundation owns Hobcaw Barony and makes it available to researchers at South Carolina's universities. The University of South Carolina's Belle W. Baruch Institute of Marine and Coastal Sciences, founded in 1969, hosts the North Inlet-Winyah Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve, one of 28 reserves around the coastal United States. Wendy Allen is its director.
