Eldred E. Prince, associate professor of history at Coastal Carolina University, will give a public reading from his new book Long Green: The Rise and Fall of Tobacco in South Carolina on Wednesday, Sept. 20 at 4 p.m. in the Wall Auditorium on Coastal's campus. The reading will be followed by an autograph session and reception at 5 p.m. The event, sponsored by the Waccamaw Center for Cultural and Historical Studies, is free and open to the public.

Long Green, published by the University of Georgia Press, is the first comprehensive history of Bright Leaf tobacco culture of any state in more than 50 years. It traces the economic history of tobacco in South Carolina from the colonial period to the present. The book was written in collaboration with the late Robert R. Simpson of Coker College, who died in 1995.

The book examines rise of cigarette smoking in the 19th and 20th centuries, the relationship between tobacco growers and manufacturers, the impact of World War I, the Great Depression and World War II, and the evolution of the government-sponsored price support program in the 1950s and '60s.

The book also traces the modernization and consolidation of tobacco culture in the 1970s and the impact of health issues relating to smoking and tobacco use. The story concludes with speculations on the future of Bright Leaf and possible alternatives for former tobacco growers in the Pee Dee region of South Carolina.

A native of Loris, S.C., Prince has deep roots in Horry County, one of the leading tobacco producing areas of the Pee Dee. Prince, who joined the Coastal faculty in 1987, earned a bachelor's degree, master's degree and Ph.D. in history from the University of South Carolina.

For more information, contact Coastal's Office of Marketing Communications at 349-2015.