Restrictions to Access

No restrictions. Open for research.

Restrictions to Use

No usage restrictions.

Copyright Notice

Copyright is retained by the authors of items in these papers, or their descendants, as stipulated by United States copyright law.

Preferred Citation

[Identification of item], in the John Roy Robinson Diary #5531-z, Southern Historical Collection, The Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Acquisitions Information

Purchased from Michael Brown Rare Books of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in July 2012 (Acc. 102073).

Sensitive Materials Statement

Manuscript collections and archival records may contain materials with sensitive or confidential information that is protected under federal or state right to privacy laws and regulations, the North Carolina Public Records Act (N.C.G.S. § 132 1 et seq.), and Article 7 of the North Carolina State Personnel Act (Privacy of State Employee Personnel Records, N.C.G.S. § 126-22 et seq.). Researchers are advised that the disclosure of certain information pertaining to identifiable living individuals represented in this collection without the consent of those individuals may have legal ramifications (e.g., a cause of action under common law for invasion of privacy may arise if facts concerning an individual's private life are published that would be deemed highly offensive to a reasonable person) for which the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill assumes no responsibility.

Processed by: Jodi Berkowitz, May 2016

Encoded by: Jodi Berkowitz, May 2016

The following terms from Library of Congress Subject Headings suggest topics, persons, geography, etc. interspersed through the entire collection; the terms do not usually represent discrete and easily identifiable portions of the collection--such as folders or items.

Clicking on a subject heading below will take you into the University Library's online catalog.

• Arkansas--History.
• Diaries.
• Fort Gibson (Okla.)--History.
• Oklahoma--History.
• Railroad bridges--Maintenance and repair.
• Robinson, John Roy, 1887-1973.

John Roy Robinson, son of John Wesley Robinson (1844-1928) and Mary Marie Forrester (1849-1941), was born 17 April 1887 at West Fork, Ark. and died 26 September 1973 at Fayetteville, Ark. He married Maude Leona Gilbreath (1888-1914) and they had one child, Gilbert Ervin Robinson (1911-1911), who died at the age of 9 months. Robinson was a railroad bridge builder and later served in World War One.

The collection consists of a diary, dated 20 November 1913 to 11 June 1914, and containing 150 pages written in pencil. Documented in the diary are the author's travels through Arkansas and Oklahoma (occasionally on horseback) looking for work, the murder of two men, a visit to Fort Gibson where Robinson's grandfather (David Elbert Robinson) was stationed during the Second Seminole War, Robinson's grandmother's house burning down, smallpox, and the death of his wife. Routine entries detail bridge work in eastern Oklahoma and Arkansas, where Robinson primarily performed repairs and maintenance of stringer bridges for the railroad.