The book will be released in January
Here’s the CliffsNotes version of Joseph P. Riley Jr.’s new memoir, Windows on Washington Square (Evening Post Books, January 2025): basically everything we enjoy and love about Charleston today stems from bold decisions made by the former mayor during his 40 years of visionary leadership. Taking a stroll along Waterfront Park where kids splash in the fountains and couples snuggle on park benches. Meandering along King Street, where locals and visitors shop, eat, and explore. Enjoying enhanced public parks, revitalized neighborhoods, stronger public schools, vibrant arts and culture, Spoleto. You name it, and Riley’s fingerprints are on it. If the memoir’s 17 chapters were a musical album, it’d be dubbed Riley’s Greatest Hits. If it were a Marvel flick, we’d title it Masters of the Public Realm. Most fittingly, I call it a primer on how holding public office can be an act of public service, not of amassing (and abusing) power.
Not that Charleston’s 60th mayor, who held the office for four decades, didn’t wield power. He understood that City Hall operated under a “strong mayor” structure and used his strength with confidence. Though he had his detractors, Riley based decisions on what he believed served the greater good—uplifting minorities, especially Charleston’s African American citizens, and championing the public realm for the benefit of the little guy/gal. “I’m talking about working confidently to move the city forward to achieve something in the best interest of all. A mayor who focuses on the aspirations, goodness, and optimism of the citizens is a builder of a forward-thinking, happy, and beautiful city,” he writes.
In a chapter devoted to affordable housing—an issue as confounding in the 1980s as today—Riley describes his desire to shift from “housing projects” toward smaller, attractive, affordable housing throughout the city, designed to blend into existing neighborhoods. “Imagine what we can do: A child who lives in one of the houses would walk out the front door and be surrounded by good people—the owner of a business across the street or the medical student who lives next door, the teachers, homemakers, coaches, ministers, and lots of friends. The child would be among people who cared about their neighbors with beams of affection and support. That’s what we are going to do!” Lofty? Yes. Feasible? Yes, when matched by Riley’s perseverance and skillful political machination. And that’s Riley’s hallmark: decisions driven not by greed or bottom line, but by dreams of a culture of care, a vision fueled by “beams of affection and support.”
The memoir recounts how plans for Waterfront Park, Charleston Place, the South Carolina Aquarium, the Federal Courthouse restoration, and the International African American Museum were driven by his vision of a more beautiful and expansive city. Though only 32 when he took office in 1975, Riley grew alongside his hometown and matured into one of the most respected and beloved mayors in the United States.
As readers follow his evolution, his memoir serves as a blueprint for how to lead with vision, savvy, and heart. It’s not all wonky—we glean personal tidbits, like how his boyhood backyard pony, Queeny, once ran rogue down Broad Street; how Pat Conroy wrote much of The Great Santini at the Riley dining table; and how his fishing trips with his two young sons were fueled by microwaved honeybuns. There are flashbacks of old Charleston, where a Citadel ring and membership in the Hibernian Society were immediate entrée to influence and power. Riley had that entrée, and he used it to open doors for others.
During his first term in 1979, Riley traveled to England and Germany with other mayors to learn about city design. The overarching question—“Was it possible to make our cities relevant, safe, and successful?” These pages, and our current thriving Holy City, prove the answer is yes.
