Abstract: Timothy Duffy (1963- ), folklorist and musician, produced field recordings of the American roots tradition as an undergraduate at Warren Wilson College and while working on a folklore master’s degree at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. A few years after graduating in 1991, he co-founded the Music Maker Relief Foundation (MMRF), a non-profit organization near Hillsborough, N.C., that helps southern roots tradition musicians meet their financial needs and gain recognition for their work. The collection includes chiefly sound recordings, but there are also artist files, CD liner proofs, correspondence, photographs, posters, documentation, video recordings, DVDs, and miscellaneous items. Most of the material relates to Duffy’s work with MMRF. Sound recordings include Duffy’s folklore thesis fieldwork in the Black Mountains of North Carolina and recordings of blues, gospel, and R& B artists such as Walt Davis, Ray Greene, Jeeter Riddle, James Guitar Slim Stephens, Etta Baker, Willa Mae Buckner, Guitar Gabriel, Cool John Ferguson, Cootie Stark, Cora Mae Bryant, Sammy Mayfield, Neal Pattman, Beverly Guitar Watkins, Jerry McCain, Essie Mae Brooks, Precious Bryant, Preston Fulp, Macavine Hayes, Algia Mae Hinton, John Dee Holeman, Captain Luke Mayer Luther, Taj Mahal, and the Greene Acres Picking Party. Some of the sound recordings include interviews with artists.

Repository: Southern Folklife Collection

Collection Highlights: There are sound recordings, oral histories, and artist files for numerous gospel, R&B, and blues artists.

Abstract: J. Taylor Doggett is a businessman and writer who has extensively researched, among various other interests, the 1950s R&B group the 5 Royales, swing bandleaders, and musicians associated with the University of North Carolina. He lives in Greensboro, N.C. The collection consists of three series: 5 Royales Materials; UNC Bandleaders Materials; and Other R&B, Jazz, and Doo Wop Materials. The Five Royales series documents Doggett’s extensive research and collecting efforts relating to the Winston-Salem, N.C., R&B vocal group of that name and the careers of constituent members Lowman Pauling, Clarence Paul, Curtis Pauling, Obadiah Carter, Johnny Tanner, Eugene Tanner, Otto Jeffries, and William Samuels. There is also music of the Royal Sons, EL Pauling and the Royalton, and the Charlie Little Jazz Ferguson Orchestra. The UNC Bandleaders series reflects Doggett’s interest in sweet jazz bandleaders associated with the University of North Carolina, including Kay Kyser, Hal Kemp, Skinnay Ennis, and John Scott Trotter. Also in this series are other performers, including Kyser’s College of Musical Knowledge, Harry Babbitt, Merwyn Bogue (Ish Kabibble), Libby Holman, Georgia Carroll Kyser, Ginny Simms, and Bo Thorpe. The 5 Royales and UNC Bandleaders series both include audio and video recordings, printed materials, and correspondence. The Other R&B, Doo Wop, Jazz, and Blues Materials series contains printed materials and recordings that reflect Doggett’s broader musical interests.

Repository: Southern Folklife Collection

Abstract: Kevin Delaney was born in 1946 in Washington, D.C. Between 1970 and 1974 he traveled through Ireland, Scotland, and the American Midwest and Southeast, recording country, blues, gospel, bluegrass, and old-time musicians and performers who otherwise might not have been heard. The collection documents the culture and history of Irish and American music. It consists primarily of field recordings made by Kevin Delaney in various regions of Ireland and the American Southeast. There are also many dubbed recordings of both Irish and American folk music. The Irish field recordings are primarily individual performances, while the dubbed recordings are groups of musicians playing different instruments, including fiddle, uillean pipes, spoons, flute, and pennywhistle. There are also some examples of Gaelic and shape-note singing. Songs include jigs, airs, reels, strathspeys, and others. The American recordings are composed primarily of fiddle and banjo music, along with some spoken word material. Some recordings are of Tommy Jarrell. There is also a practice tape of Delaney on fiddle and guitar. Several commercial audiocassettes are included, as well as dubbed recordings of jazz, blues, and pop music. Also included are Delaney’s personal notebooks documenting the musicians he recorded while in the field, along with several posters, fliers, a collection of musicians’ autographs, and a photograph.

Repository: Southern Folklife Collection

Collection Highlights: Includes a poster probably from a musical score, entitled “Old Black Joe”, arranged by J.W. Turner

Abstract: The collection includes family and business correspondence, chiefly 1835-1856, account books, ledgers, and day books of the Davidson family of Mecklenburg County, N.C., who lived at Rural Hill Plantation, 1833-1890; Ingleside Plantation, 1867-1875; and Dixon Plantation, Gaston County, N.C., 1872-1893. Among the correspondents are Adam Brevard Davidson (1808-1896); his wife Mary Laura (Springs) Davidson of York County, S.C.; her father, John Springs; John M. W. Davidson, a physician; Robert H. M. Davidson, a lawyer; and William S. M. Davidson. Also included is correspondence with members of the family in Florida. Volumes consist of ledgers and family business records, 1813-1874.

Repository: Southern Historical Collection

Collection Highlights: Folder 1 includes letters discussing the high price of slaves in Florida and an investment scheme to purchase North Carolina slaves to resell in Florida (6 November 1836).

Abstract: Native of Mississippi, Confederate officer, and California lawyer. Personal correspondence and diaries of Dixon, consisting chiefly of correspondence between Dixon and his parents while he was a student at the University of Virginia,

1860-1861; a Confederate officer with the 11th Mississippi Infantry Regiment in Virginia; and after the war, when he was a lawyer and rancher in California. His parents lived near Greenville, Miss., and, during part of the Civil War, in Demopolis, Ala. Correspondence concerns family affairs, experiences at the University of Virginia, effects of the war in Mississippi, Dixon’s war experiences, and other matters. Also included is Dixon’s diary, 1858-1865, kept while he was at Greenville, at the University of Virginia, and during the war. Among other items are letters, 1868-1869, to Dixon’s wife, Constance Maynard Dixon, from her grandfather, Duff Green (1791-1875); letters from Dixon’s friend, Henry Ewing, Confederate officer in Tennessee and newspaperman in St. Louis; and photographs of fellow soldiers and students and of others.

Repository: Southern Historical Collection

Collection Highlights: The collection includes correspondence discussing the Fugitive Slave Act (1860); the “fate of negroes who followed enemy’s columns,” (1862); the faithfulness of slaves during the war (1863); the disinclination of former slaves to sign unspecified “contracts” in Alabama (1867); the refusal of former slaves to work for former slaveholders (1867); former slaves as sharecroppers (1869); blacks wearing Union Army uniforms (1869); and the opinions of whites toward blacks following the war (1869). Microfilm available.

Abstract: Charles William Dabney was a scientist, educator, and author. Also represented in the collection are four generations of his ancestors, including William Dabney (ca. 1707-1772?); Charles Dabney (1745-1829); Charles William Dabney (1786-1833); Charles William Dabney (1809-1895); Robert Lewis Dabney (1820-1898); Lavinia (Morrison) Dabney (1823-1905); and James Morrison (fl. 1817-1865). Papers from 1716 to about 1833 consist of business and personal correspondence and other papers of William Dabney, Charles Dabney, and Charles William Dabney (1786-1833), and their relatives, chiefly in Hanover, King William, and Louisa counties, Va. These items concern tobacco planting and shipping and the purchase of merchandise, and post-Revolutionary War land acquisitions in Kentucky; plantation management; current events; and family activities. Papers of Robert Lewis Dabney, clergyman, teacher, Confederate staff officer and chaplain, concern Presbyterian church matters, Hampden-Sidney College, Union Theological Seminary of Virginia, the Civil War, a biography of Stonewall Jackson, and Dabney and Morrison family news from Virginia, Tennessee, and Texas. Other Civil War material includes original and photocopied correspondence from Robert E. Lee, and reports and casualty lists of the battle of Kernstown, 1862. There are also several letters from clergyman Benjamin Mosby Smith (1811-1893). Correspondence of Charles William Dabney (1855-1945) concerns projects of the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture; the development of mineral resources; the advancement of scientific, technical, agricultural, and general education; his education in Virginia and Germany; scientific work in state agencies in North Carolina, 1880-1887; his presidency of the University of Tennessee, 1887-1904, and of the University of Cincinnati, 1904-1920; conflict with German-Americans in Cincinnati; family matters as reflected in correspondence with his wife and other family members, 1877-1925; and the writing of his memoirs and works on educational history. Dabney’s materials also include writings, addresses, scrapbook materials, and pictures. Volumes in the collection include ten 18th-century Virginia account books; James Morrison’s sermon notes; and copies of family histories by William McPheeters, 1842, and John Blair Dabney, 1850.

Repository: Southern Historical Collection

Collection Highlights: Includes a report from a slave of the cruelty of an overseer, requests for baby clothes for slaves, and a certificate of reward for the return of a runaway slave (1772). In a letter dated 14 November 1852, Charles William Dabney wrote to Robert Lewis Dabney, justifying slavery. The collection also contains an undated letter from R. L. Dabney to the Head of the Freedmen’s Bureau. Also included are three images of African American agricultural workers and domestic servants (Images P-1412/120, 123, and 138).

Abstract: Correspondence, memoranda, and records of Bert L. Bennett, North Carolina Democratic Party state executive committee chairman, and other staff members at campaign headquarters in Raleigh, N.C., during the election of 1960. Included are items relating to the gubernatorial campaign of Terry Sanford and a series of letters (263 items) from citizens of North Carolina to presidential candidate John F. Kennedy, many of them dealing with the issue of Kennedy’s Catholicism.

Repository: Southern Historical Collection

Abstract: Marion Stuart Davis was a Louisburg, N.C., architect, who specialized in the construction of churches and schools. His sister, Mabel Irwin Davis, was a teacher at Louisburg College and a librarian of the Warren County Memorial Library. Includes Marion Stuart Davis’s personal and business correspondence, architectural project files, legal and financial papers, Masonic papers, family history materials, and materials relating to the history of Louisburg College. Also included are Mabel Irwin Davis materials, chiefly letters; financial papers; writings; school papers; and notebooks containing attendance lists, notes related to teaching at Louisburg College, and original writings. There are also some materials relating to Davis’s sister, Mary Davis Allen, who served as president of Louisburg College, and to other family members.

Repository: Southern Historical Collection

Collection Highlights: Folder 147 is titled “Franklin County Public Schools projects: agriculture building and African American high school, 1949”.

Abstract: Native of Connecticut, Episcopal minister in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Tennessee, and educator. Personal and family papers of Douglas and of his wife, Sarah (Tucker) Douglas, of Natchez, Miss., before and after their marriage in 1857. Correspondents were members of both families, scattered over a wide geographical range, including Connecticut, New Jersey, Louisiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, Tennessee and Illinois, and attending several schools and colleges, including the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine in the 1840s and the College of William and Mary in the 1850s. There are papers relating to the Episcopal Church in Connecticut, Louisiana, Tennessee, and especially in Dry Grove, Hinds County, Miss., where Douglas served as minister, 1871-1881, operated the Bishop Green Training School and Associate Mission, and edited the diocesan monthly. Correspondents include Bishop William Mercer Green, Oscar Kibbe, Leonidas Polk, and David Ker. Volumes include pocket diaries, 1855 and 1857, of Douglas in Connecticut and Waterproof, La., respectively; an album about student life at the University of Mississippi, ca. 1860; and notes made on ocean crossings to and from Europe in 1897, including comments on the weather, social activities, and fellow passengers.

Repository: Southern Historical Collection

Collection Highlights: A letter from S. J. Gilmore in Salina, KS, advising against transporting poor people, white or black, to Kansas or other new territories (10 December 1877).

Abstract: Miscellaneous typed items including the Civil War reminiscences of W. R. I. Dalton, Confederate naval courier to England and France; an account by Hamilton H. Dalton of his service with the U.S. Navy off the African coast, including the capture of a slave ship; and a Henderson family genealogy.

Repository: Southern Historical Collection