"S" is for "South Carolina on My Mind." State song. “South Carolina on My Mind” became an official state song in 1984. The ballad was composed by Hank Martin and performed and recorded by him and his partner Buzz Arledge. Both were native South Carolinians and professional musicians in Nashville and New York City. Martin was inspired to write the state song in part by the poem “A Carolina Love Song” written by his father-in-law, the Reverend Riley Munday—a Baptist minister, humorist, and sometime poet-in-residence at Columbia College. The lyrics evoke the state’s natural beauty from the mountains to the sea. The General Assembly’s intention in adopting “South Carolina on My Mind” as a state song was “to help inspire pride in our State and improve the quality of life among all South Carolinians.”