The tour focuses on the Robert Mills House, which was designed by nationally prominent architect and South Carolina native, Robert Mills. Relating the story of Robert Mills and the history of the building, the tour teaches students about life in 19th-century South Carolina, the story of the preservation of the structure in the 1960s, and this National Historic Landmark's important architectural features.

The Mann-Simons Site was the home of Celia Mann, a free-black midwife who lived in Columbia before the Civil War. Mann’s descendents occupied the house until 1970 when preservationists saved the home from demolition. . The cottage tour can be used to introduce students to the history of Columbia’s African-American community by examining the lives of the different generations of the Mann and Simons families who inhabited it during the antebellum, Reconstruction, Jim Crow, and Civil Rights eras.

The Hampton-Preston Mansion once was home to one of South Carolina's most powerful and prestigious planter class families. This tour introduces students to the family and their lifestyles before and during the Civil War. Aspects of a Victorian household are also addressed in this tour.