Thomas Dixon, Jr.
Encyclopedia
Thomas F. Dixon, Jr. was an American
Baptist
minister, playwright
, lecturer, North Carolina state legislator
, lawyer, and author, perhaps best known for writing The Clansman
— which was to become the inspiration for D. W. Griffith
's film, The Birth of a Nation
(1915).
, Dixon was the son of Thomas Dixon, Sr., a Baptist minister and farmer, and Amanda Elvira McAfee. As a young man, Thomas Sr. had inherited a number of slaves from his first wife's father. Dixon Sr., while not an abolitionist, did not want to own slaves himself. At one point he was offered US$100,000 for his slaves, but he declined the offer, worried that their new owner might mistreat them. In his adolescence Dixon helped out on the family farm, an experience that he hated, but that he later would say helped him to relate to the plight of the working man. Dixon grew up during Reconstruction following the Civil War. The government confiscation of farm land, the corruption of local politicians, and particularly the vengefulness of Federal troops coupled with the general lawlessness of the time all helped to shape young Dixon into a staunch opponent of what he called one of history's greatest tragedies.
Among Dixon's earliest memories, and perhaps his most important, was the widow of a Confederate soldier who had served under Dixon's uncle Col. Leroy McAfee pleading for his family's help. The widow claimed that a black man had raped her daughter. Public outrage was extremely high with the Civil War still fresh in the minds of most southerners. That night the Ku Klux Klan
hanged and repeatedly shot the alleged rapist in the town square. Dixon's mother commented to him that night that "[The Klan are] our people--they're guarding us from harm." It was a moment that etched itself into Dixon's memory: he felt that the Klan's actions were justified, and that desperate times called for desperate measures. Dixon's father, Thomas, Sr., and his uncle Col. McAfee, both joined the Ku Klux Klan early in its history with the aim of "bring[ing] order" to the tumultuous times, and Col. McAfee even attained the rank of Chief of the Klan of the Piedmont
area of North Carolina
. But, after witnessing the corruption and scandal involved in the Klan they would both dissolve their affiliation with the group and attempt to disband it within their region.
where he studied history and political science. As a student there, Dixon performed remarkably well, and in 1883, after only four years, Dixon earned a masters degree. His record at Wake Forest was outstanding, and he earned the distinction of achieving the highest student honors ever awarded at the university to that date. Following his graduation from Wake Forest, Dixon received a scholarship to attend the Johns Hopkins University
political science program. Here he met and befriended future President Woodrow Wilson
. On January 11, 1884, despite the objections of his friend Woodrow Wilson, Dixon left Johns Hopkins University to pursue an education and a career on the stage.
Dixon headed to New York City
and enrolled in the Frobisher School to study drama. As an actor, Dixon's physical appearance became a problem - he was six foot three inches tall but only weighed 150 pounds, making for a very lanky appearance. One producer remarked that because of his appearance Dixon would not succeed as an actor, but he complimented Dixon for his intelligence and attention to detail and recommended that Dixon put his love for the stage into scriptwriting. Despite the compliment, Dixon returned home to North Carolina in shame.
Upon his return to Shelby, Dixon quickly realized that he was in the wrong place to begin to cultivate his playwriting skills. After his initial disappointment from his Frobisher rejection Dixon, with the encouragement of his father, enrolled in the Greensboro Law School in Greensboro, North Carolina
. An excellent student, Dixon received his law degree in 1885.
. Despite being only twenty years of age and not even old enough to vote for himself, he won the election by a two-to-one margin, a victory that was attributed to his masterful oratory skills. Dixon retired from politics in 1886 after only one term in the legislature. He said that he was disgusted by the corruption and the back-door deals of the lawmakers, and he is quoted as referring to politicians as "the prostitutes of the masses." However short, Dixon's political career gained him popularity throughout the South for his championing of Confederate
veterans' rights.
Following his career in politics, Dixon practiced private law for a short time, but he would find little satisfaction as a lawyer and he would soon leave the profession to become a minister.
minister on October 6, 1886, with his first practice in Greensboro, where he had attended law school. Church records show that in October 1886 Dixon moved to the parsonage at 125 South John Street in Goldsboro, NC to serve as the Pastor of the First Baptist Church. Already a lawyer and fresh out of Wake Forest Seminary, life in Goldsboro must not have been what young Dixon had been expecting for a first preaching assignment. The social upheaval that Dixon portrays in his later works was largely melded through Dixon’s experiences in the crucible that was post-war Wayne County during reconstruction. General Sherman’s army seized the Goldsboro railroad hub at the end of their march through the south, and Union troops occupied it for years after the war. Local author James Monroe Hollowell's Wartime Reminiscences gives detailed accounts of troops committing numerous war crimes against the population. Newly paroled confederates returning to Wayne County became Klansmen to combat the “reign of terror” by the black troops. On April 10, 1887 Dixon moved to the Second Baptist Church in Raleigh, North Carolina. His popularity rose quickly, and before long he was offered a position at the Dudley Street Church in Boston, Massachusetts. As his popularity on the pulpit grew, so did his demand as a lecturer. While preaching in Boston, Dixon was asked to give the commencement address at Wake Forest University. Additionally, he was offered a possible honorary doctorate from the university. Dixon himself rejected the offer, but he sang high praises about a relative unknown who Dixon believed deserved the honor, his old friend Woodrow Wilson. A reporter at Wake Forest who heard Dixon's praises of Wilson put a story on the national wire, giving Wilson his first national exposure.
In August 1889, Dixon accepted a post in New York City, despite the fact that his Boston congregation was willing to double his pay if he would stay. In New York, Dixon would preach at new heights, bumping elbows with the likes of John D. Rockefeller
and Theodore Roosevelt
(who he helped in a campaign for New York Governor). Sometime in the next five years, however, Dixon became disillusioned with the church, and he began to believe that he could no longer belong to any particular denomination. So, in 1895, Dixon resigned from the Baptist ministry, and started preaching at a nondenominational church. He continued preaching there until 1899 when he began to lecture full time.
It was on the lecture circuit that Dixon found his niche. He enjoyed the work tremendously, and he was often hailed as the best lecturer in the nation. He gained an immense following throughout the country, and particularly in the south, where he played up his speeches on the plight of the working man, and the horrors of Reconstruction. It was during such a lecture tour that Dixon attended a theatrical version of Harriet Beecher Stowe's
Uncle Tom's Cabin
. Dixon could hardly contain his anger and outrage at the play; it is said that he literally "wept at [the play's] misrepresentation of southerners." Dixon vowed that the "true story" of the South should be told. As a direct result of this experience, Dixon wrote his first novel The Leopard's Spots
(1902), which employs several characters, including Simon Legree, recycled from Stowe's novel.
Dixon viewed Southern black America with contempt. He and his family had been slaveowners. Later in his life it is possible to view personalized yet softer contradictory statements in his writings regarding African-Americans.
His "Trilogy of Reconstruction" consisted of The Leopard's Spots
, The Clansman
(1905), and The Traitor (1907). In these best-selling novels, which presented highly imaginative fiction as hard historical fact, Dixon used historical romance to present Negro
es as inferior to whites and to glorify the antebellum American South. While he opposed slavery
, he believed in racial segregation
. Dixon also wrote about the evils of socialism
, particularly expressed in his trilogy: The One Woman (1903), Comrades (1909), and The Root of Evil (1911). In 1919, the book Comrades was made into a motion picture titled Bolshevism on Trial
. In the play
, The Sins of the Father, which was produced in 1910-11, Dixon himself played the leading role. His photoplay
, The Birth of a Nation, appeared in 1915. Thomas Dixon's writings are often quoted by White Nationalist organizations today.
Dixon was the author of 22 novels; additionally, he wrote many plays, sermons, and works of nonfiction. He also wrote some film scripts. His writing mostly centered around three major themes: (1) the need for racial purity; (2) the evils of socialism
; and (3) the necessity of a stable family with a traditional role for the wife/mother. A common theme found in his novels is violence against white woman, mostly, though not always by a Southern black man. These crimes are almost always avenged through the course of the story, the source of which most likely stems from a belief of Dixon's that his mother was sexually abused as a child. He wrote his last novel, The Flaming Sword, in 1939 and not long after he was crippled by a cerebral hemorrhage.
Dixon married his first wife Harriet Bussey on 3 March 1886. His wife and he were forced to elope to Montgomery, Alabama
, after Bussey's father refused to give his consent. Dixon and Harriet Bussey had three children together: Thomas III, Louise, and Gordon. Following a career of major ups and downs that saw Dixon earn and lose millions, Dixon ended his career as a court clerk in Raleigh, North Carolina
. Harriet died on 29 December 1937. Fourteen months later, on 26 February 1939 Dixon suffered a crippling cerebral hemorrhage. Less than a month later, from his hospital bed, Dixon married Madelyn Donovan
, an actress who had played a role in a film adaptation of one of his novels. Dixon is buried with his second wife Madelyn in Sunset Cemetery in Shelby, North Carolina. His gravestone reads: "Thomas Dixon Jr. 1864-1946 Lawyer-Minister-Author-Orator-Playwright-Actor A Native of Cleveland County and Most Distinguished Son of His Generation. -- He was the author of 28 books dealing with the reconstruction period. The most popular of which were 'The Clansman' and 'The Leopard's Spots,' from which 'The Birth of a Nation' was dramatized. -- His Wife Madelyn Donovan 1894-1975."
His brother, the popular preacher Amzi Clarence Dixon, was famous for helping to edit The Fundamentals
, a series of articles (and later volumes) influential in fundamentalist Christianity
.
According to Glenda Elizabeth Gilmore's Gender and Jim Crow, a possible source of Dixon's hatred for blacks and black/white sexual relationships may lie in his father's affair with the family's black cook, which resulted in a son. Dixon's half-brother, who lived in New York, spoke often of his famous relative, despite being dismissed by Dixon as "that darky [who] is always getting...into trouble" (Gilmore, pp. 66–70).
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
Baptist
Baptist
Baptists comprise a group of Christian denominations and churches that subscribe to a doctrine that baptism should be performed only for professing believers , and that it must be done by immersion...
minister, playwright
Playwright
A playwright, also called a dramatist, is a person who writes plays.The term is not a variant spelling of "playwrite", but something quite distinct: the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder...
, lecturer, North Carolina state legislator
North Carolina General Assembly
The North Carolina General Assembly is the state legislature of the U.S. state of North Carolina. The General Assembly drafts and legislates the state laws of North Carolina, also known as the General Statutes...
, lawyer, and author, perhaps best known for writing The Clansman
The Clansman
The Clansman: An Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan is the title of a novel published in 1905. It was the second work in the Ku Klux Klan trilogy by Thomas F. Dixon, Jr. that included The Leopard's Spots and The Traitor. It was influential in providing the ideology that helped support the...
— which was to become the inspiration for D. W. Griffith
D. W. Griffith
David Llewelyn Wark Griffith was a premier pioneering American film director. He is best known as the director of the controversial and groundbreaking 1915 film The Birth of a Nation and the subsequent film Intolerance .Griffith's film The Birth of a Nation made pioneering use of advanced camera...
's film, The Birth of a Nation
The Birth of a Nation
The Birth of a Nation is a 1915 American silent film directed by D. W. Griffith and based on the novel and play The Clansman, both by Thomas Dixon, Jr. Griffith also co-wrote the screenplay , and co-produced the film . It was released on February 8, 1915...
(1915).
Early years
Born in Shelby, North CarolinaShelby, North Carolina
Shelby is a city in Cleveland County, North Carolina, United States. The population was 19,477 at the 2000 census. It is the county seat of Cleveland County.-Geography:Shelby is located at ....
, Dixon was the son of Thomas Dixon, Sr., a Baptist minister and farmer, and Amanda Elvira McAfee. As a young man, Thomas Sr. had inherited a number of slaves from his first wife's father. Dixon Sr., while not an abolitionist, did not want to own slaves himself. At one point he was offered US$100,000 for his slaves, but he declined the offer, worried that their new owner might mistreat them. In his adolescence Dixon helped out on the family farm, an experience that he hated, but that he later would say helped him to relate to the plight of the working man. Dixon grew up during Reconstruction following the Civil War. The government confiscation of farm land, the corruption of local politicians, and particularly the vengefulness of Federal troops coupled with the general lawlessness of the time all helped to shape young Dixon into a staunch opponent of what he called one of history's greatest tragedies.
Among Dixon's earliest memories, and perhaps his most important, was the widow of a Confederate soldier who had served under Dixon's uncle Col. Leroy McAfee pleading for his family's help. The widow claimed that a black man had raped her daughter. Public outrage was extremely high with the Civil War still fresh in the minds of most southerners. That night the Ku Klux Klan
Ku Klux Klan
Ku Klux Klan, often abbreviated KKK and informally known as the Klan, is the name of three distinct past and present far-right organizations in the United States, which have advocated extremist reactionary currents such as white supremacy, white nationalism, and anti-immigration, historically...
hanged and repeatedly shot the alleged rapist in the town square. Dixon's mother commented to him that night that "[The Klan are] our people--they're guarding us from harm." It was a moment that etched itself into Dixon's memory: he felt that the Klan's actions were justified, and that desperate times called for desperate measures. Dixon's father, Thomas, Sr., and his uncle Col. McAfee, both joined the Ku Klux Klan early in its history with the aim of "bring[ing] order" to the tumultuous times, and Col. McAfee even attained the rank of Chief of the Klan of the Piedmont
Piedmont Triad
The Piedmont Triad, or Triad, is a north-central region of the U.S. state of North Carolina that consists of the area within and surrounding the three major cities of Greensboro, Winston-Salem, and High Point. This close group or "triad" of cities lies in the Piedmont geographical region of the...
area of North Carolina
North Carolina
North Carolina is a state located in the southeastern United States. The state borders South Carolina and Georgia to the south, Tennessee to the west and Virginia to the north. North Carolina contains 100 counties. Its capital is Raleigh, and its largest city is Charlotte...
. But, after witnessing the corruption and scandal involved in the Klan they would both dissolve their affiliation with the group and attempt to disband it within their region.
Education
In 1877, Dixon entered the Shelby Academy, where he earned a diploma in only two years. In September 1879 Dixon enrolled at Wake ForestWake Forest University
Wake Forest University is a private, coeducational university in the U.S. state of North Carolina, founded in 1834. The university received its name from its original location in Wake Forest, north of Raleigh, North Carolina, the state capital. The Reynolda Campus, the university's main campus, is...
where he studied history and political science. As a student there, Dixon performed remarkably well, and in 1883, after only four years, Dixon earned a masters degree. His record at Wake Forest was outstanding, and he earned the distinction of achieving the highest student honors ever awarded at the university to that date. Following his graduation from Wake Forest, Dixon received a scholarship to attend the Johns Hopkins University
Johns Hopkins University
The Johns Hopkins University, commonly referred to as Johns Hopkins, JHU, or simply Hopkins, is a private research university based in Baltimore, Maryland, United States...
political science program. Here he met and befriended future President Woodrow Wilson
Woodrow Wilson
Thomas Woodrow Wilson was the 28th President of the United States, from 1913 to 1921. A leader of the Progressive Movement, he served as President of Princeton University from 1902 to 1910, and then as the Governor of New Jersey from 1911 to 1913...
. On January 11, 1884, despite the objections of his friend Woodrow Wilson, Dixon left Johns Hopkins University to pursue an education and a career on the stage.
Dixon headed to New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
and enrolled in the Frobisher School to study drama. As an actor, Dixon's physical appearance became a problem - he was six foot three inches tall but only weighed 150 pounds, making for a very lanky appearance. One producer remarked that because of his appearance Dixon would not succeed as an actor, but he complimented Dixon for his intelligence and attention to detail and recommended that Dixon put his love for the stage into scriptwriting. Despite the compliment, Dixon returned home to North Carolina in shame.
Upon his return to Shelby, Dixon quickly realized that he was in the wrong place to begin to cultivate his playwriting skills. After his initial disappointment from his Frobisher rejection Dixon, with the encouragement of his father, enrolled in the Greensboro Law School in Greensboro, North Carolina
Greensboro, North Carolina
Greensboro is a city in the U.S. state of North Carolina. It is the third-largest city by population in North Carolina and the largest city in Guilford County and the surrounding Piedmont Triad metropolitan region. According to the 2010 U.S...
. An excellent student, Dixon received his law degree in 1885.
Political career
It was during law school that Dixon's father convinced Thomas Jr. to enter politics. After graduation, Dixon ran for the local seat in the North Carolina General AssemblyNorth Carolina General Assembly
The North Carolina General Assembly is the state legislature of the U.S. state of North Carolina. The General Assembly drafts and legislates the state laws of North Carolina, also known as the General Statutes...
. Despite being only twenty years of age and not even old enough to vote for himself, he won the election by a two-to-one margin, a victory that was attributed to his masterful oratory skills. Dixon retired from politics in 1886 after only one term in the legislature. He said that he was disgusted by the corruption and the back-door deals of the lawmakers, and he is quoted as referring to politicians as "the prostitutes of the masses." However short, Dixon's political career gained him popularity throughout the South for his championing of Confederate
Confederate States of America
The Confederate States of America was a government set up from 1861 to 1865 by 11 Southern slave states of the United States of America that had declared their secession from the U.S...
veterans' rights.
Following his career in politics, Dixon practiced private law for a short time, but he would find little satisfaction as a lawyer and he would soon leave the profession to become a minister.
Ministry and lecturing
Dixon was ordained as a BaptistBaptist
Baptists comprise a group of Christian denominations and churches that subscribe to a doctrine that baptism should be performed only for professing believers , and that it must be done by immersion...
minister on October 6, 1886, with his first practice in Greensboro, where he had attended law school. Church records show that in October 1886 Dixon moved to the parsonage at 125 South John Street in Goldsboro, NC to serve as the Pastor of the First Baptist Church. Already a lawyer and fresh out of Wake Forest Seminary, life in Goldsboro must not have been what young Dixon had been expecting for a first preaching assignment. The social upheaval that Dixon portrays in his later works was largely melded through Dixon’s experiences in the crucible that was post-war Wayne County during reconstruction. General Sherman’s army seized the Goldsboro railroad hub at the end of their march through the south, and Union troops occupied it for years after the war. Local author James Monroe Hollowell's Wartime Reminiscences gives detailed accounts of troops committing numerous war crimes against the population. Newly paroled confederates returning to Wayne County became Klansmen to combat the “reign of terror” by the black troops. On April 10, 1887 Dixon moved to the Second Baptist Church in Raleigh, North Carolina. His popularity rose quickly, and before long he was offered a position at the Dudley Street Church in Boston, Massachusetts. As his popularity on the pulpit grew, so did his demand as a lecturer. While preaching in Boston, Dixon was asked to give the commencement address at Wake Forest University. Additionally, he was offered a possible honorary doctorate from the university. Dixon himself rejected the offer, but he sang high praises about a relative unknown who Dixon believed deserved the honor, his old friend Woodrow Wilson. A reporter at Wake Forest who heard Dixon's praises of Wilson put a story on the national wire, giving Wilson his first national exposure.
In August 1889, Dixon accepted a post in New York City, despite the fact that his Boston congregation was willing to double his pay if he would stay. In New York, Dixon would preach at new heights, bumping elbows with the likes of John D. Rockefeller
John D. Rockefeller
John Davison Rockefeller was an American oil industrialist, investor, and philanthropist. He was the founder of the Standard Oil Company, which dominated the oil industry and was the first great U.S. business trust. Rockefeller revolutionized the petroleum industry and defined the structure of...
and Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt was the 26th President of the United States . He is noted for his exuberant personality, range of interests and achievements, and his leadership of the Progressive Movement, as well as his "cowboy" persona and robust masculinity...
(who he helped in a campaign for New York Governor). Sometime in the next five years, however, Dixon became disillusioned with the church, and he began to believe that he could no longer belong to any particular denomination. So, in 1895, Dixon resigned from the Baptist ministry, and started preaching at a nondenominational church. He continued preaching there until 1899 when he began to lecture full time.
It was on the lecture circuit that Dixon found his niche. He enjoyed the work tremendously, and he was often hailed as the best lecturer in the nation. He gained an immense following throughout the country, and particularly in the south, where he played up his speeches on the plight of the working man, and the horrors of Reconstruction. It was during such a lecture tour that Dixon attended a theatrical version of Harriet Beecher Stowe's
Harriet Beecher Stowe
Harriet Beecher Stowe was an American abolitionist and author. Her novel Uncle Tom's Cabin was a depiction of life for African-Americans under slavery; it reached millions as a novel and play, and became influential in the United States and United Kingdom...
Uncle Tom's Cabin
Uncle Tom's Cabin
Uncle Tom's Cabin; or, Life Among the Lowly is an anti-slavery novel by American author Harriet Beecher Stowe. Published in 1852, the novel "helped lay the groundwork for the Civil War", according to Will Kaufman....
. Dixon could hardly contain his anger and outrage at the play; it is said that he literally "wept at [the play's] misrepresentation of southerners." Dixon vowed that the "true story" of the South should be told. As a direct result of this experience, Dixon wrote his first novel The Leopard's Spots
The Leopard's Spots
The Leopard's Spots is the first novel of Thomas Dixon's Ku Klux Klan trilogy that included The Clansman and The Traitor. In the novel Dixon offers an account of Reconstruction in which he portrays the villains as a former slave driver, Northern carpetbaggers and emancipated slaves; and heroes as...
(1902), which employs several characters, including Simon Legree, recycled from Stowe's novel.
Writings
| "I thank God that there is not to-day the clang of a single slave's chain in this continent. Slavery may have had its beneficent aspects, but democracy is the destiny of the race, because all men are bound together in the bonds of fraternal equality with common love." -Thomas Dixon, Jr., 1896 from Protestantism and Its Causes New York |
"...no amount of education of any kind, industrial, classical or religious, can make a Negro a white man or bridge the chasm of centuries which separate him from the white man in the evolution of human nature." -Thomas Dixon, Jr., 1905 from Booker T. Washington and the Negro p. 1, Saturday Evening Post, August 19, 1905 |
Dixon viewed Southern black America with contempt. He and his family had been slaveowners. Later in his life it is possible to view personalized yet softer contradictory statements in his writings regarding African-Americans.
His "Trilogy of Reconstruction" consisted of The Leopard's Spots
The Leopard's Spots
The Leopard's Spots is the first novel of Thomas Dixon's Ku Klux Klan trilogy that included The Clansman and The Traitor. In the novel Dixon offers an account of Reconstruction in which he portrays the villains as a former slave driver, Northern carpetbaggers and emancipated slaves; and heroes as...
, The Clansman
The Clansman
The Clansman: An Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan is the title of a novel published in 1905. It was the second work in the Ku Klux Klan trilogy by Thomas F. Dixon, Jr. that included The Leopard's Spots and The Traitor. It was influential in providing the ideology that helped support the...
(1905), and The Traitor (1907). In these best-selling novels, which presented highly imaginative fiction as hard historical fact, Dixon used historical romance to present Negro
Negro
The word Negro is used in the English-speaking world to refer to a person of black ancestry or appearance, whether of African descent or not...
es as inferior to whites and to glorify the antebellum American South. While he opposed slavery
Slavery
Slavery is a system under which people are treated as property to be bought and sold, and are forced to work. Slaves can be held against their will from the time of their capture, purchase or birth, and deprived of the right to leave, to refuse to work, or to demand compensation...
, he believed in racial segregation
Racial segregation
Racial segregation is the separation of humans into racial groups in daily life. It may apply to activities such as eating in a restaurant, drinking from a water fountain, using a public toilet, attending school, going to the movies, or in the rental or purchase of a home...
. Dixon also wrote about the evils of socialism
Socialism
Socialism is an economic system characterized by social ownership of the means of production and cooperative management of the economy; or a political philosophy advocating such a system. "Social ownership" may refer to any one of, or a combination of, the following: cooperative enterprises,...
, particularly expressed in his trilogy: The One Woman (1903), Comrades (1909), and The Root of Evil (1911). In 1919, the book Comrades was made into a motion picture titled Bolshevism on Trial
Bolshevism on Trial
Bolshevism on Trial is a 1919 American motion picture drama made by the Mayflower Photoplay Company and distributed through Lewis J. Selznick's Select Pictures Corporation....
. In the play
Play (theatre)
A play is a form of literature written by a playwright, usually consisting of scripted dialogue between characters, intended for theatrical performance rather than just reading. There are rare dramatists, notably George Bernard Shaw, who have had little preference whether their plays were performed...
, The Sins of the Father, which was produced in 1910-11, Dixon himself played the leading role. His photoplay
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
, The Birth of a Nation, appeared in 1915. Thomas Dixon's writings are often quoted by White Nationalist organizations today.
Dixon was the author of 22 novels; additionally, he wrote many plays, sermons, and works of nonfiction. He also wrote some film scripts. His writing mostly centered around three major themes: (1) the need for racial purity; (2) the evils of socialism
Socialism
Socialism is an economic system characterized by social ownership of the means of production and cooperative management of the economy; or a political philosophy advocating such a system. "Social ownership" may refer to any one of, or a combination of, the following: cooperative enterprises,...
; and (3) the necessity of a stable family with a traditional role for the wife/mother. A common theme found in his novels is violence against white woman, mostly, though not always by a Southern black man. These crimes are almost always avenged through the course of the story, the source of which most likely stems from a belief of Dixon's that his mother was sexually abused as a child. He wrote his last novel, The Flaming Sword, in 1939 and not long after he was crippled by a cerebral hemorrhage.
Family life
Montgomery, Alabama
Montgomery is the capital of the U.S. state of Alabama, and is the county seat of Montgomery County. It is located on the Alabama River southeast of the center of the state, in the Gulf Coastal Plain. As of the 2010 census, Montgomery had a population of 205,764 making it the second-largest city...
, after Bussey's father refused to give his consent. Dixon and Harriet Bussey had three children together: Thomas III, Louise, and Gordon. Following a career of major ups and downs that saw Dixon earn and lose millions, Dixon ended his career as a court clerk in Raleigh, North Carolina
Raleigh, North Carolina
Raleigh is the capital and the second largest city in the state of North Carolina as well as the seat of Wake County. Raleigh is known as the "City of Oaks" for its many oak trees. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the city's 2010 population was 403,892, over an area of , making Raleigh...
. Harriet died on 29 December 1937. Fourteen months later, on 26 February 1939 Dixon suffered a crippling cerebral hemorrhage. Less than a month later, from his hospital bed, Dixon married Madelyn Donovan
Madelyn Clare
Madelyn Clare was an American actress during the early twentieth century. Born in Cleveland, Ohio, she was married to writer and director Thomas Dixon, Jr....
, an actress who had played a role in a film adaptation of one of his novels. Dixon is buried with his second wife Madelyn in Sunset Cemetery in Shelby, North Carolina. His gravestone reads: "Thomas Dixon Jr. 1864-1946 Lawyer-Minister-Author-Orator-Playwright-Actor A Native of Cleveland County and Most Distinguished Son of His Generation. -- He was the author of 28 books dealing with the reconstruction period. The most popular of which were 'The Clansman' and 'The Leopard's Spots,' from which 'The Birth of a Nation' was dramatized. -- His Wife Madelyn Donovan 1894-1975."
His brother, the popular preacher Amzi Clarence Dixon, was famous for helping to edit The Fundamentals
The Fundamentals
The Fundamentals or The Fundamentals: A Testimony To The Truth edited by A. C. Dixon and later by Reuben Archer Torrey is a set of 90 essays in 12 volumes published from 1910 to 1915 by the Bible Institute of Los Angeles. They were designed to affirm orthodox Protestant beliefs and defend against...
, a series of articles (and later volumes) influential in fundamentalist Christianity
Fundamentalist Christianity
Christian fundamentalism, also known as Fundamentalist Christianity, or Fundamentalism, arose out of British and American Protestantism in the late 19th century and early 20th century among evangelical Christians...
.
According to Glenda Elizabeth Gilmore's Gender and Jim Crow, a possible source of Dixon's hatred for blacks and black/white sexual relationships may lie in his father's affair with the family's black cook, which resulted in a son. Dixon's half-brother, who lived in New York, spoke often of his famous relative, despite being dismissed by Dixon as "that darky [who] is always getting...into trouble" (Gilmore, pp. 66–70).
List of works
- The Leopard's SpotsThe Leopard's SpotsThe Leopard's Spots is the first novel of Thomas Dixon's Ku Klux Klan trilogy that included The Clansman and The Traitor. In the novel Dixon offers an account of Reconstruction in which he portrays the villains as a former slave driver, Northern carpetbaggers and emancipated slaves; and heroes as...
(1902) - The One Woman (1903)
- The ClansmanThe ClansmanThe Clansman: An Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan is the title of a novel published in 1905. It was the second work in the Ku Klux Klan trilogy by Thomas F. Dixon, Jr. that included The Leopard's Spots and The Traitor. It was influential in providing the ideology that helped support the...
(1905) - The Life Worth Living (1905)
- The Traitor (1907)
- Comrades (1909)
- The Root of Evil (1911)
- The Sins of the Father (1912)
- The Southerner: A Romance of the Real Lincoln (1913)
- The Victim: A Romance of the Real Jefferson DavisJefferson DavisJefferson Finis Davis , also known as Jeff Davis, was an American statesman and leader of the Confederacy during the American Civil War, serving as President for its entire history. He was born in Kentucky to Samuel and Jane Davis...
(1914) - The Foolish Virgin (1915)
- The Fall of a NationThe Fall of a Nation (novel)The Fall of a Nation is a novel by Thomas Dixon Jr. First published by D. Appleton and Company in 1916, Dixon directed a film version released the same year.-External links:*...
(1916) - The Way of a Man (1918)
- A Man of the People (1920)
- The Man in Gray (1921)
- The Flaming Sword (1939)