HIRAM HARRIS, Esq., was born September 17, 1814, in Roane County, N. C. [sic], and is the son of John Harris, a native of Harrisburg, Penn., born about 1775. That city derived its name from our subject’s great-great-grandfather, John Harris, who donated the property where Harrisburg now stands to the State of Pennsylvania for the purpose of building that city.
Our subject passed his early days on the farm, and after reaching years of discretion began farming for himself. He also partially educated himself, and chose school-teaching as his profession. May 5, 1842, he wedded Lucy A. Tillford, of this county. In 1850 he taught ten months in Texas, and in 1862 taught five months in the State of Mississippi. Since then he has been teaching exclusively in this State. In 1844 he was elected to the office of magistrate in the Sixth District, but resigned the office at the end of two years, and was elected magistrate of the Eighteenth District in 1873 and re-elected the following term. In 1880 Mr. Harris was one of the delegates to the convention in Nashville, to nominate a candidate for governor. He is a Democrat in politics, and he and wife are members in good standing in the Methodist Episcopal Church South.
Transcribed by Kathryn Hopkins
Goodspeed Publishing Co. History of Tennessee from the Earliest Time to the Present: Together with an Historical and a Biographical Sketch of Maury, Williamson, Rutherford, Wilson, Bedford & Marshall Counties, Besides a Valuable Fund of Notes, Reminescences [Sic], Observations, Etc., Etc. Easley, S.C.: Southern Historical Press, 1988.