Born in the Mt Moriah community of eastern Wake County, author Bernice Kelly Harris attended Mt Moriah Academy and graduated from Meredith College in 1913. She subsequently studied playwriting under Frederick H. ("Proff") Koch during summer sessions at the University of North Carolina.
For 13 years, she taught school, primarily in Seaboard, NC, where she married Herbert Kavanaugh Harris in 1926. Her early writings included one-act plays and newspaper feature articles. Her first novel, Purslane, was published in 1939 and received that year's Mayflower Cup Award for best novel by a North Carolinian. It was followed by Portulaca (1941), Sweet Beulah Land (1943), Sage Quarter (1945), Janey Jeems (1946), Hearthstones (1948), and Wild Cherry Tree Road (1951). Folk Plays of Eastern Carolina, a collection of seven one-act plays, was published in 1940.
A member of the prestigious North Carolina Writers Conference, she also served as a president of the NC Literary and Historical Association, and on the boards of trustees of the State Library Commission and the North Carolina Arts Council. Posthumously, she received the Brown-Hudson Folklore Award from the NC Folklore Society for her books, "Southern Home Remedies" (1968) and "Strange Things Happen" (1971). In 1996, she was among the first inductees in the newly-formed North Carolina Literary Hall of Fame. "The idea all along seemed to be to turn out a writer, and it ended by my turning out myself," she said in a 1956 interview with Bernadette Hoyle for the book, Tar Heel Writers I Know. "I always wanted to write."
For 13 years, she taught school, primarily in Seaboard, NC, where she married Herbert Kavanaugh Harris in 1926. Her early writings included one-act plays and newspaper feature articles. Her first novel, Purslane, was published in 1939 and received that year's Mayflower Cup Award for best novel by a North Carolinian. It was followed by Portulaca (1941), Sweet Beulah Land (1943), Sage Quarter (1945), Janey Jeems (1946), Hearthstones (1948), and Wild Cherry Tree Road (1951). Folk Plays of Eastern Carolina, a collection of seven one-act plays, was published in 1940.
A member of the prestigious North Carolina Writers Conference, she also served as a president of the NC Literary and Historical Association, and on the boards of trustees of the State Library Commission and the North Carolina Arts Council. Posthumously, she received the Brown-Hudson Folklore Award from the NC Folklore Society for her books, "Southern Home Remedies" (1968) and "Strange Things Happen" (1971). In 1996, she was among the first inductees in the newly-formed North Carolina Literary Hall of Fame. "The idea all along seemed to be to turn out a writer, and it ended by my turning out myself," she said in a 1956 interview with Bernadette Hoyle for the book, Tar Heel Writers I Know. "I always wanted to write."
Born in the Mt Moriah community of eastern Wake County, author Bernice Kelly Harris attended Mt Moriah Academy and graduated from Meredith College in 1913. She subsequently studied playwriting under Frederick H. ("Proff") Koch during summer sessions at the University of North Carolina.
For 13 years, she taught school, primarily in Seaboard, NC, where she married Herbert Kavanaugh Harris in 1926. Her early writings included one-act plays and newspaper feature articles. Her first novel, Purslane, was published in 1939 and received that year's Mayflower Cup Award for best novel by a North Carolinian. It was followed by Portulaca (1941), Sweet Beulah Land (1943), Sage Quarter (1945), Janey Jeems (1946), Hearthstones (1948), and Wild Cherry Tree Road (1951). Folk Plays of Eastern Carolina, a collection of seven one-act plays, was published in 1940.
A member of the prestigious North Carolina Writers Conference, she also served as a president of the NC Literary and Historical Association, and on the boards of trustees of the State Library Commission and the North Carolina Arts Council. Posthumously, she received the Brown-Hudson Folklore Award from the NC Folklore Society for her books, "Southern Home Remedies" (1968) and "Strange Things Happen" (1971). In 1996, she was among the first inductees in the newly-formed North Carolina Literary Hall of Fame. "The idea all along seemed to be to turn out a writer, and it ended by my turning out myself," she said in a 1956 interview with Bernadette Hoyle for the book, Tar Heel Writers I Know. "I always wanted to write."
For 13 years, she taught school, primarily in Seaboard, NC, where she married Herbert Kavanaugh Harris in 1926. Her early writings included one-act plays and newspaper feature articles. Her first novel, Purslane, was published in 1939 and received that year's Mayflower Cup Award for best novel by a North Carolinian. It was followed by Portulaca (1941), Sweet Beulah Land (1943), Sage Quarter (1945), Janey Jeems (1946), Hearthstones (1948), and Wild Cherry Tree Road (1951). Folk Plays of Eastern Carolina, a collection of seven one-act plays, was published in 1940.
A member of the prestigious North Carolina Writers Conference, she also served as a president of the NC Literary and Historical Association, and on the boards of trustees of the State Library Commission and the North Carolina Arts Council. Posthumously, she received the Brown-Hudson Folklore Award from the NC Folklore Society for her books, "Southern Home Remedies" (1968) and "Strange Things Happen" (1971). In 1996, she was among the first inductees in the newly-formed North Carolina Literary Hall of Fame. "The idea all along seemed to be to turn out a writer, and it ended by my turning out myself," she said in a 1956 interview with Bernadette Hoyle for the book, Tar Heel Writers I Know. "I always wanted to write."
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