Collection Details:

Collection Name and Number: Harris Dickson Collection (Z/0028.000).
Creator/Collector: Harris Dickson; and others.
Date(s): Dates.
Size: 6.00 cubic feet.
Language(s): English.
Processed by: MDAH staff, 1973.
Provenance: Gift of unknown donor before 1973.
Repository: Archives & Records Services Division, Mississippi Department of Archives & History.

 

Rights and Access:

Access restrictions: Collection is open for research.

Publication rights: Copyright assigned to the MDAH. All requests for permission to publish or quote from manuscripts must be submitted in writing to Reference Services. Permission for publication is given on behalf of the MDAH as the owner of the physical items and as the owner of the copyright in items created by the donor. Although the copyright was transferred by the donor, the respective creator may still hold copyright in some items in the collection. For further information, contact Reference Services.

Copyright notice: This material may be protected by copyright law (Title 17, U.S. Code).

Preferred citation: Harris Dickson Collection (Z/0028.000), Mississippi Department of Archives & History.

 

Related MDAH Collections:

Harris Dickson Papers (Z/0028.001)
Harris Dickson Letter (Z/0028.002)
Harris Dickson Papers (Z/0124)
Harris Dickson Collection (Z/0168)
Harris Dickson "Magnolia Sketches" Collection (Z/0852)

 

Biography:

Harris Dickson

William Harris Dickson, son of Harriet Emma Hardenstein (1844-1926) and Thomas Hyde Dickson (1841-1908), was born on July 21, 1868, in Yazoo City, Mississippi, the eldest of his siblings: Helion Dickson (1872-1941), Harriet "Hattie" Dickson (1874-1877), and Thomas Hyde Dickson, Jr. (1876-1939). Shortly after Dickson's birth, his family moved to Vicksburg, then to Meridian, and finally to Jackson, Mississippi. Dickson became interested in shorthand during his late teens, and after mastering it, he founded a court-reporting firm. In 1889, after a particularly long legal case, Dickson took some of his earnings and traveled to France to see the Paris Exposition.

Upon his return from Europe, Dickson attended a summer session at the law school of the University of Virginia. Dickson then accepted a job as secretary to Andrew Price, United States representative from the third congressional district of Louisiana. While Dickson was in Washington, D.C., he received a bachelor of laws degree from Columbian University (now George Washington University) in 1893. Following his graduation, Dickson returned to Vicksburg and opened his legal practice. With few clients, Dickson kept himself busy by working on a novel, The Black Wolf's Breed. While exchanging some law books with the publisher, Bowen-Merrill, Dickson included the manuscript to this novel, which, to his surprise, the company accepted and published in 1899.

While Dickson's legal career progressed (he became a Vicksburg Municipal Court judge in 1905), his literary career also flourished. In 1907, the Saturday Evening Post published an article by Dickson that recounted some of his experiences as a judge in Vicksburg. The Saturday Evening Post also published Dickson's most popular stories, a series detailing the adventures of a Reconstruction-era African American character from Vicksburg nicknamed "Old Reliable." His tales of "Old Reliable" were compiled in two volumes, Old Reliable and Old Reliable in Africa; these stories were also adapted for the stage. Other books by Dickson include the following: Siege of Lady Resolute, She That Hesitates, Children of the River, Duke of Devil-May-Care, The Story of King Cotton, and An Old Fashioned Senator. Dickson served as a correspondent for Collier's magazine during World War I, and in the 1930s, he served as a technical advisor to the Work Projects Administration in Mississippi.

Dickson married Madeleine Livingston Metcalf of Louisville, Kentucky, in 1906; they had two daughters, Elizabeth Harris Dickson (1910-1998) and Madeleine M. Dickson (1913-1999). He died in Vicksburg on March 17, 1946, and was buried in Cedar Hill Cemetery in Vicksburg.

 

Scope and Content Note:

Correspondence, journals, notes, speeches, newspaper clippings, manuscripts of published works and miscellaneous papers of Harris Dickson (1868-1946), lawyer, judge and novelist of Vicksburg, Warren County, Mississippi.

 

Series Identification:

Series 1: Correspondence. 1888-1946; n.d.

Box 1: n.d., 1888-1900.
Box 2: 1910-1928.
Box 3: 1929-1946.
 

Series 2: Manuscripts.

Box 4: A to D.
Box 5: E to L.
Box 6: M to P.
Box 7: Q to Z.
 

Series 3: Other materials. 1889; 1910; 1917; n.d.

Box 8: Miscellaneous manuscripts, biographical material, miscellaneous material, journal (1889), journal (1917).
Box 9: journal (1910).
Box 10: Newspaper clippings, miscellaneous.
Box 11: Newspaper clipping of book reviews; queries; speeches.
Box 12: Notes.
Boxes 13-15: Writers' Project.

 

Box List:

Box list to be completed at a later date.