Daufuskie Island’s post office opened in 1911, and 1 of its places is on the National Register
Most of Daufuskie Island was built recently: 0.0% of its homes predate 1940 and the median home dates from 2005. 1 place in town is on the National Register, among them a historic district with 57 buildings. Below: 6 old photos and papers and maps from 1945 on.
The Daufuskie Island post office opened in 1911, the earliest record of the town by name. Another post office, Daufuskie (1892), opened inside today’s town and later closed.
2020 census: 557115 years
Founding year: the first Daufuskie Island post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0).The full story ↓
What stands out about Daufuskie Island’s past
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
Daufuskie Island has been inhabited for thousands of years, as evidenced by ancient piles of discarded oyster shells exhibiting pottery shards from all phases of the hunter-gathering period. Prior to European arrival numerous Indian tribes inhabited the Lowcountry and islands. Culturally and linguistically these tribes were of Muskogean stock. Daufuskie comes from the Muscogee language and means "sharp feather", for the island's distinctive shape.
Nothing in the archives for these yearsWeddings on Main Street, storms, parades, school pictures, the old store. If it’s in your family album, it belongs here.
Every edition of the U.S. Geological Survey’s map of Daufuskie Island. Tap a year, or press play to watch the town change.
1945Bluffton sheet · 1:62,500
U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (public domain), via Esri’s collection of the scans. The red ring marks the center of Daufuskie Island.
Then & now
Stand where they stood
No then-and-now pairs yet. Take a photo from the same spot as an old one and they appear here side by side.
Retake this viewHaig Point Front Range Light, Daufuskie Island (Beaufort County, South Carolina), 1885
Find the spot, match the angle, and add your photo. It becomes the first then-and-now pair on Daufuskie Island’s page.
Founding dates: Wikidata, Wikipedia, the U.S. post office records of Blevins & Helbock (CC0) and the Census. Homes by year built: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register of Historic Places: National Park Service (list of May 22, 2026). Old photos, postcards and papers: Wikimedia Commons, the Library of Congress and other public archives, credited on each item’s page. Maps: U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (via Esri) and Sanborn fire-insurance maps (Library of Congress). History text and census tables: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Places that used to be: USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021). How TownRatings grades history →
From Wikimedia Commons (5), the Library of Congress (1), the National Register of Historic Places (1), Wikipedia, U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock) and the USGS Geographic Names Information System. Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
1776
1777
1885
