John Davidson came to the North Carolina back country circa 1751 as a young man, with his sister and widowed mother. Typical of Scots-Irish settlers, they arrived with little more than basic farming tools, determined to make it on their own terms. Davidson worked hard, prospered, married well and built a plantation on the Catawba River he called Rural Hill. The Davidson's were loyal British citizens who paid their taxes and participated in colonial government. When the Crown's overbearing authority interfered, independence became paramount and Davidson and his neighbors became soldiers in the Revolutionary War. After the war Davidson managed his plantation, created shad fisheries, helped develop the local iron industry with his sons-in-law and was an early planter of cotton. His sons and grandsons, along with their slave families, continuously increased and improved the acreage and became early practitioners of scientific farming. Drawing on public documents, family papers and slave records, this history describes how a fiercely independent family grew their lands and fortunes into a lasting legacy.

Vol 1 905p Vol 2 961p.

The most comprehensive state project of its kind, the Dictionary provides information on some 4,000 notable North Carolinians whose accomplishments and occasional misdeeds span four centuries. Much of the bibliographic information found in the six volumes has been compiled for the first time. All of the persons included are deceased. They are native North Carolinians, no matter where they made the contributions for which they are noted, or non-natives whose contributions were made in North Carolina.

Describes the history of the Bryson families of North Carolina, Tennessee and Texas, starting with Scotch-Irish immigration to the US in the 1700s, through to Davis and Gladys Bryson in the 20th century. Includes extensive photos of original documents, illustrations of life during each generation, discussions of what life was like for each family, and coverage of many different branches of the family. The author writes of the old photographs, letters, clippings, and historic information that he and two of his cousins collected: "I realized that many of these items resided with a single individual and might soon be gone. The idea of a way to make this information available to a wider range of friends and relatives started to form. .... Thus, I felt inspired to write this book." "It was surprising to me to see the large number of our ancestors who in every sense of the word were true pioneers and moved to the very edge of a new frontier. Hence, the title of this book: The Bryson Ancestors--On the Edge of New Frontiers."