The Man Who Never Sleeps
How one South Carolinian is dramatically improving the world and striving to do so daily
By Chris Carter
CAMDEN, SOUTH CAROLINA – So much has been written over the years about Dr. Tom Mullikin, founding chair of the gubernatorially established S.C. Floodwater Commission, former U.S. Army officer, and retired two-star commander of the S.C. State Guard among other titles and hats worn. I was reminded of Mullikin’s tireless work during a recent conversation with a colleague about South Carolina’s annual SC7 expedition, led by Mullikin and including so many superstar leaders of the Palmetto State.
Unlike hugely populated states like New York and California – where great people often migrate to and settle to become even greater – South Carolina seems to breed people like Mullikin who since its founding in 1670 has produced stars who remain and pour their souls back into the very “provinces” which bore and nurtured them to greatness in the first place.
A little over a year ago, my friend and fellow writer W. Thomas Smith Jr. wrote a piece about Mullikin entitled, UNASSAILABLE GREATNESS, in which he said: “Most of the great men I’ve known have achieved their greatness through hard work, tenacity, a dogged refusal to retreat in the face of overwhelming obstacles or odds, and ALWAYS giving and putting others first: And frankly bringing them with you.”
He was speaking of course of Mullikin, his pro-bono work for and support of citizens living in the Republic of Fiji, the Republic of Moldova, Ecuador and the Galapagos Islands, his helping lead a National Geographic expedition across a stretch of the Alaskan wilderness, his leading expeditions – hiking and climbing – across mountain ranges stretching across every continent on earth, achieving four (so far) of the world’s seven great summits, SCUBA diving in all of the world’s oceans, and having earned parachutist wings from numerous foreign military forces. All of this and his now-three years of work and leadership with the SOUTH CAROLINA SEVEN (SC7) Expedition across S.C. from the mountains to the sea. Again, pouring back into the state which nurtured him. Mullikin hails from Camden, the Palmetto State’s oldest inland city.
Mullikin’s work is primarily for his state to be sure, but it impacts others for the good around the world.
For instance, in addition to his practice of energy and environmental law, he serves under a joint appointment as a professor teaching classes at the University of South Carolina (USC, his alma mater – undergrad and law school), both at the USC School of Law and the USC’s College of Hospitality, Retail, and Sport Management. He also teaches at in the College of Science at Coastal Carolina University and as a “visiting professor” at Universidad de San Francisco in Quito, Ecuador.
As part of his work in Ecuador, Mullikin is currently planning a December expedition – dubbed Humboldt to Darwin (so-named for naturalists Alexander Von Humboldt and Charles Darwin) – from Mt. Chimborazo to the famed Galápagos Islands. This expedition will begin atop Mt. Chimborazo (the point on the Earth’s surface that is farthest from the Earth’s center and the highest point from the planet’s surface and up into the atmosphere) which also means participants will climb the great Ecuadorian mountain. The expedition includes a trip down the mountain on mountain-bikes following the Inca Trail through the Andean highlands, then kayaking to the coast before taking a short flight to the Galápagos archipelago made famous by Darwin in the 19th century.
But that’s barely scratching the surface of his ongoing work.
This month, September 14 in fact, Mullikin was elected chairman of the Board of the Carolina Cup Racing Association. For years, his Mullikin Law Firm has been the presenting sponsor of the famous annual steeplechase race in Camden, S.C. where year-after-year Mullikin and wife Virginia Ann have hosted grand parties and celebrations days before, the day of, and the day after the historic Cup.
The following day, Sept. 15, Mullikin received a letter from South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster appointing him to the board of the S.C. Conservation Bank with a term expiring July 1, 2026.
Later this month (September), Mullikin will address members of the South Carolina Land Trust Network during their Fall meeting at Harbison State Forest in Columbia.
He will also be speaking at a national martial arts conference on the contributions and significance of women in martial arts. Mullikin is himself a black belt and a member of the S.C. Black Belt Hall of Fame.
In October, he will be kayaking on the Danube River and mountain climbing in Austria with wife Virginia Ann. That same month he will join an Atchafalaya Basin Ecotour, an expedition to the largest wetland-swamp in the United States. Located in south central Louisiana, it is a combination of wetlands and river delta area where the Atchafalaya River and the Gulf of Mexico converge.
And at some point over the next few weeks, he will carve out time, energy, and personal resources to fly to Uganda for several days on the invitation of a faith-based outreach group requesting that Mullikin might address indigenous energy and water issues in that ever-troubled east African country.
Meanwhile, Mullikin continues to lead the Smart Reef project, building (and building on) a smart reef system along the South Carolina coast as an extension of a broader initiative focused on supporting increased integrated real-time environmental observations and advanced modeling supporting an array of beneficial applications. The information gathered by the smart reef system will be fed into Coastal Carolina University’s interactively coupled ocean-atmosphere-wave-hydrologic modeling system which will improve the advanced modeling applications to help inform discussions about hurricanes and other tropical storm impacts (e.g. flooding and storm surge). The smart reef data also supports research related to waves and currents as well as a wide range of other natural resource management concerns.
In 2020, the S.C. Floodwater Commission partnered with Coastal Carolina in advancing the smart reef Initiative, and since then much of the physical reef-deployment work has been accomplished by Mullikin-led teams of SCUBA divers and former U.S. military special operators organized under FORCE BLUE often during the final days of the last three SC7 expeditions.
Smart reef work will continue throughout September and October, and well beyond.
As if these things are not enough, Mullikin is following up with UN officials in discussions aimed at shutting down the illegal killing of two of the African rhinoceros species (the white rhino Ceratotherium simum and black rhino Diceros bicornis). As if he doesn’t have enough on his plate between now and his two October expeditions and his December expedition to mainland Ecuador and the Galapagos, Mullikin is meeting IN SEPTEMBER with Texas Christian University’s Rhino Initiative to collaborate on the protection of the African Rhinos.
What else? Ever the champion for all South Carolinians, Mullikin is also in the process of filing a ‘Writ of Mandamus Petition’ before the U.S. Supreme Court requesting the court to reorder the petitioners in the original cases that would become known as Brown v Board of Education to list the first case filed before that court which was the South Carolina case of Briggs v Elliott. The petition would essentially give the original petitioners their proper ‘first’ place in history.
How does he do it? “Chopping wood every day and the love of my Lord Jesus Christ who I give all credit,” Mullikin says: Also reading books, professional articles, briefs, gathering information from a variety of sources, consulting, writing, relying on the output and counsel of fellow attorneys, business and military leaders, and a close-knit group of friends and special advisors.
Governor McMaster has referred to Mullikin as “the most interesting man in the world.”
But again, we’re only scratching the surface in describing the work of the man who apparently, obviously, never sleeps.
– Chris Carter is a former semi-pro football player and U.S. Air Force veteran whose articles have appeared in OpsLens, Human Events, Canada Free Press, Deutsche Welle, NavySEALs.com and other publications.