L. Mendel Rivers - Honors

Honors

Rivers received numerous accolades and honors to commemorate his service to the nation and to the 1st congressional district. In 1948, a stretch of highway from the crossing of U.S. Route 78 over Meeting Street (known as the Five-Mile Viaduct) to where U.S. Route 52 meets the Berkeley County line was named as Rivers Avenue because Rivers was key in getting funds from Congress to pave it as the first four-lane road in North Charleston. The town of St. Stephen held a day long celebration for Rivers in 1964 and named the secondary road that ran from St. Stephen's Episcopal Church to the house he grew up in as Mendel Rivers Road.

A seven story office building located across Meeting Street from Marion Square was named the L. Mendel Rivers Federal Building in 1964 The building was vacated in 1999 following damage by Hurricane Floyd and it was purchased in January 2008 by a private developer. The L. Mendel Rivers Elementary School in Altus, Oklahoma was named for Rivers because he prevented the Altus Air Force Base from closing by making it the location of the training school for the C-5 Galaxy. Charleston Southern University honored Rivers continual support of the institution by naming its college library as the L. Mendel Rivers Library in October 1970.

Rivers was greatly admired by the soldiers and they would repay his strong support by their adulation. They felt that he was their congressman and called him the "Serviceman's Best Friend." A road in Cam Ranh Bay, Vietnam was called the Mendel Rivers Parkway and the soldiers gave Rivers a captured Viet Cong carbine that he prominently displayed in his office. For obtaining drastically reduced air fares for soldiers on furlough, they gave him a cap with six stars and "The Big Boss" inscribed on it, indicating that Rivers outranked all military officials.

After his death, the Navy honored his dedication by naming the submarine USS L. Mendel Rivers (SSN-686) in his honor in 1971. His friends raised money create a small park and have a bust placed adjacent to the O.T. Wallace County Office Building in downtown Charleston. Rivers was named as one the "Magnificent Ten Charlestonians Who Shaped the 20th Century" by Charleston Magazine in December 1999 for his efforts to expand the military in his district.