Bernice Kelly Harris Papers Inventory (#3804)

Manuscripts Department, Library of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Contact Information:

Manuscripts Department

CB#3926, Wilson Library

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Chapel Hill, NC 27514-8890

Phone: 919/962-1345

Fax: 919/962-3594

Email: mss@email.unc.edu

URL: http://www.lib.unc.edu/mss/

Processed by:

Carolyn Hamby with assistance from Culley Holderfield and Abigail Peoples

Date Completed:

March 1996

Encoded by:

Jackie Dean

Descriptive Summary Including Abstract

Title

Bernice Kelly Harris Papers (#3804) 1913-1973, 1996-1997

Creator

Harris, Bernice Kelly.

Extent

About 8,000 items (11.0 linear feet).

Repository

Southern Historical Collection

Abstract

Bernice Kelly Harris (1891-1973) was an author and playwright, largely on southern topics, and leader in civic, cultural, and religious organizations of Seaboard, N.C. She participated in the W.P.A. Federal Writers' Project, collecting "life histories" of ordinary people in the South. Correspondence and writings of Bernice Kelly (Mrs. H. K.) Harris including letters from editors, publishers, other writers, and friends; fan mail; and writings. Correspondents include J. O. Bailey, W. T. Couch, Jonathan Daniels, Inglis Fletcher, L. H. Fountain, Harry Golden, Bernadette Hoyle, Sam Ragan, Thad Stem, Gilbert Thomas Stephenson, and Richard Gaither Walser. Also included are seventeen interviews conducted by Valerie Yow in 1996 and 1997 with relatives and friends of Bernice Kelly Harris.

Administrative Information

Access

No restrictions.

Usage Restrictions

Copyright is retained by the authors of items in these papers, or their descendants, as stipulated by United States copyright law.

Provenance

Received from Bernice Kelly Harris in 1967; from her estate in 1974; from J. O. Bailey in 1974; and from Elizabeth Bullock in 1996 (Acc. 98414). Interviews about Harris given by Valerie Yow of Chapel Hill, N.C., in November 1997 (Acc. 97141).

Processing Information

This collection was processed with support from the Randleigh Foundation Trust.

Online Catalog Terms

American literature--Women authors.

Authors, American--Correspondence.

Authors and publishers--United States.

Bailey, James Osler, 1903- .

Couch, William T. (William Terry), 1901- .

Daniels, Jonathan, 1902- .

Fletcher, Inglis, 1879-1969.

Folk literature, American--Southern States.

Fountain, L. H.

Harris, Bernice Kelly.

Hoyle, Bernadette.

Ragan, Sam, 1915- .

Stem, Thad.

Stephenson, Gilbert Thomas, 1884-1972.

Southern States--Fiction.

Walser, Richard Gaither, 1908- .

Biographical Note

Bernice Kelly Harris (8 Oct. 1891-13 Sept. 1973) was born in Wake County, N.C., daughter of William Haywood and Rosa Poole Kelly. She attended Mt. Moriah Academy and Cary High School. She graduated from Meredith College in 1913. Harris worked briefly as a principal for a school at Beulaville, Duplin County, N.C. She also taught for three years at the South Fork Institute, near Maiden in Catawba County, N.C., an academy for training rural Baptist preachers. In 1917, she went to Seaboard High School in Northampton County, N.C. She taught English there from 1917 to 1927 except for a year in Rich Square (1921-1922).

During this time, Harris continued to pursue her education by attending summer school at the University of North Carolina. She studied playwriting in 1919 and 1920 under Frederick H. Koch. Koch's love for the folk play inspired Harris. She returned to Seaboard determined to spread the "folk gospel," and to do some writing of her own. In May 1926, she married Herbert Kavanaugh Harris, a Seaboard farmer. Marriage did not dull Bernice Kelly Harris's enthusiasm for writing. She was instrumental in organizing the Northampton Players among the younger people, to write and produce plays at home before taking the best material to the state drama festival.

After 1930, began sending human interest stories and feature articles to Raleigh and Norfolk newspapers. Four of her character sketches appeared in These Are Our Lives (1939), a Federal Writers Project book. In 1939, she wrote Purslane, a novel which won the Mayflower Society Cup as the best North Carolina book of the year. Her other novels include Portulaca (1941), Sage Quarter (1945), Janey Jeems (1946), Hearthstones (1948), and Wild Cheery Tree Road (1951). She also wrote two Christmas booklets: The Very Real Truth about Christmas (1961) and The Santa on the Mantel (1964).

In 1961, Harris was president of the North Carolina Literary and Historical Association. She also served on the boards of trustees of the State Library Commission and the North Carolina Arts Council, was active in the North Carolina Writers Conference and the Reannex-Chowan Group, and taught creative writing classes at Chowan College. From her classes at Chowan came two collections, Southern Home Remedies (1968) and Strange Things Happen (1971), for which she received a Brown-Hudson Folklore Award posthumously from the North Carolina Folklore Society.

Herbert K. Harris died on 13 July 1950. Bernice Kelly Harris died 23 years later in 1973.

[Source: William S. Powell, ed. Dictionary of North Carolina Biography, Vol. 3 (Chapel Hill, N.C.: The University of North Carolina Press, 1988): 47-48.]

Collection Overview

Correspondence and writings of Bernice Kelly (Mrs. H. K.) Harris including letters from editors, publishers, other writers, and friends; fan mail; and writings. Correspondents include J. O. Bailey, W. T. Couch, Jonathan Daniels, Inglis Fletcher, L. H. Fountain, Harry Golden, Bernadette Hoyle, Sam Ragan, Thad Stem, Gilbert Thomas Stephenson, and Richard Gaither Walser. Also included are seventeen interviews conducted by Valerie Yow in 1996 and 1997 with relatives and friends of Bernice Kelly Harris.

Organization of Collection

1. Correspondence
2. Clippings and Ephemera
3. Writings
4. Unidentified Writings
Addition of November 1997

Series Descriptions

Related Collections

Federal Writers' Project (#3709)
University of North Carolina Press Records, University Archives and Records Service, UNC-CH.