Madison County AlArchives Biographies.....Harris, George M. 1820 - 
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Joy Fisher http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00001.html#0000031 September 19, 2011, 5:42 am

Source: See below
Author: Smith & De Land, publishers

  DR. GEORGE M. HARRIS was born in Madison County, this State, July 11, 1820,
and his parents were Frank E. and Mahala (Isbell) Harris, natives of the State
of Virginia. The senior Harris was born in 1800 in Appomattox County, Va., and
came with his parents to this county in 1809. The family settled at Blue
Springs, four miles north of Huntsville. Some time in 1856 or 1857, Francis E.
Harris removed to Jackson County, this State, and there spent the rest of his
life, dying in 1877.

  Dr. Harris' grandfather, Richard Harris, held the rank of captain in the
Colonial Army, and served under Washington through the Revolutionary struggle.
Coming to Madison County he purchased a large tract of Government land, and
became one of the extensive farmers of that early day. He died near Huntsville
at the great age of 94 years. His wife lived to be 80 years of age. The house,
in which he lived for many years, was enclosed by a high picket fence, with
blockhouses on each corner, and was used by his neighbors as a kind of fortress,
into which they retreated nightly for protection against the Indians.

  George M. Harris, whose name forms the caption of this sketch, was reared on
his father's farm, and at the age of 19, when he began the study of medicine, he
was probably as well informed as most any young man of his day, and he entered
upon his studies with a fair fund of general information.

  Dr. Geo. R. Wharton, a distinguished physician, was his uncle, and became his
preceptor in the study of physic. Dr. Harris was graduated from the Louisville
School of Medicine, with the degree of M. D., in 1842, and located at once at
Bellefonte, Jackson County, where he pursued the practice of his profession ten
years. He was also an extensive farmer, and about 1850, established a tannery,
in connection with which he carried on an large dry goods business. He also
manufactured the leather produced by his tannery into such articles of commerce
as were then found salable. In 1857 he removed to Meridianville, then an
important village some miles north of Huntsville, and was there engaged in
mercantile business until 1863. By this time the doctor had accumulated a pretty
large fortune in lands, merchandise and slaves. He owned a large farm in
Arkansas, to which he sent stock and negroes from North Alabama, and upon it
annually raised many bales of cotton. Though he still owns his farms, it seems
that he ceased to give them any personal supervision about 1870, as at that time
he removed to the city of Huntsville. Here he is connected with some of the
largest and most important enterprises, and gives them much of his personal
attention. He is one of the largest stockholders of the cotton factory at this
place; in fact, is the president of the company that owns it, and its great
success is probably as much due to his judicious management and direction, as to
any other cause. The Doctor was one of the organizers, and is now a director of
the North Alabama Improvement Company; also an organizer and director of the
Huntsville Electric Light Company; also largely interested in the hardware
business; and to all of these, in his own quiet unostentatious way, he gives his
personal influence and supervision.

  Doctor Harris is a broad-gauged, wideawake, enterprising, public-spirited,
present-day man, and it is to such as he that Northern Alabama must be indebted
to the grand future that awaits her, and in fact, is now dawning upon her.


Additional Comments:
Extracted from:

Northern Alabama: Historical and Biographical
Birmingham, Ala.: Smith and De Land
1888

PART IV.
MONOGRAPHS OF THE PRINCIPAL CITIES AND TOWNS IN NORTHERN AND CENTRAL ALABAMA,
TOGETHER WITH BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES OF MANY OF THEIR REPRESENTATIVE PEOPLE.


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