Members of Charleston County Council elected the Rev. Kylon Middleton, a West Ashley Democrat, to be its new chairman in a Jan. 2 shift away from the elected five-member Republican majority.

It’s engagement season — the magical time between Thanksgiving and Valentine’s Day when nearly half of all couples commit to each other.

Soft-spoken and genial, Eugene Platt wears his 86 years jauntily, like a feather in a hatband.But it does not obscure the thoughtfulness of the man, a poet of distinction.As French essayist Joseph ...