Restrictions to Access

No restrictictions

Copyright Notice

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

Sensitive Materials Statement

Manuscript collections and archival records may contain materials with sensitive or confidential information that is protected under federal or state right to privacy laws and regulations, the North Carolina Public Records Act (N.C.G.S. § 132 1 et seq.), and Article 7 of the North Carolina State Personnel Act (Privacy of State Employee Personnel Records, N.C.G.S. § 126-22 et seq.). Researchers are advised that the disclosure of certain information pertaining to identifiable living individuals represented in this collection without the consent of those individuals may have legal ramifications (e.g., a cause of action under common law for invasion of privacy may arise if facts concerning an individual's private life are published that would be deemed highly offensive to a reasonable person) for which the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill assumes no responsibility.

The following terms from Library of Congress Subject Headings suggest topics, persons, geography, etc. interspersed through the entire collection; the terms do not usually represent discrete and easily identifiable portions of the collection--such as folders or items.

• Autograph albums--North Carolina--History--19th century.
• Boardinghouses--North Carolina--Wilmington.
• Businesswomen--North Carolina.
• Diaries.
• Family--North Carolina--Social life and customs--19th century.
• Houston family.
• Houston, Alice Lee Larkins.
• Larkins family.
• Women--Diaries--North Carolina--History--19th century.
• Women--North Carolina--Social life and customs--19th century.

Alice Lee Larkins Houston lived in Lillington, N.C., in the 1860s. Sometime prior to 1865, she married Robert Houston, a lawyer with connections to Washington, D.C. Alice Lee Larkins Houston seems to have borne three children during their marriage: Percy, Mollie, and Rena. Robert Houston died at the beginning of 1870. In October of that year, Alice Lee Larkins Houston's father and her son Percy succumbed to an illness that seems to have afflicted all members of the household. After her recovery, Alice Lee Larkins Houston moved with her mother and their servant Rose to Wilmington, N.C., where she opened a boardinghouse.

The papers of Alice Lee Larkins Houston consist of an autograph book, a journal, and two loose poems. The autograph book contains greetings, 1859-1877, addressed to Alice Lee Larkins Houston by her husband, friends, and acquaintances. The journal contains periodic entries, 1870-1871, about Alice Lee Larkins Houston's life after the death of her husband in 1870. In the journal, she described everyday life, illnesses that afflicted the Larkins and Houston families, and social activities during her early days as a boardinghouse operator in Wilmington, N.C. The two undated poems appear to have been written by Alice Lee Larkins Houston.