Dorris Alexander "Dee" Brown was born on February 28, 1908, in Alberta, Louisiana. His father died when he was five and at a young age, his family, (mother, brother, two sisters) moved to the town of Stephens, where his mother became the postmaster. In 1924, the family moved to Little Rock, where Brown attended high school. After graduating from high school in 1927, Brown got a job as a printer for the Harrison Daily Times and became a journalist. In 1928, realizing he did not know enough to be a reporter, Brown went to Arkansas State Teachers College (ASTC), now the University of Central Arkansas (UCA), in Conway, graduating in 1931 with a Bachelor of Arts and Education degree with a major in history. He married Sally Stroud, of Wilson, Mississippi, in 1934; when they were both students at Arkansas. They had two children. Browne earned a BLS (Bachelor of Library Science) degree in 1935 from George Washington University and received a Master of Science in 1952, from the University of Illinois. From 1948-1972, he was librarian of agriculture at the University of Illinois, Urbana. Brown's grandmother remembered the California gold rush, had driven ox wagons, and could recall the Civil War in detail. She spiked his interest as a youth and consequently all of Brown's nineteen books have modern day settings and are rooted in the American frontier. His best known work is Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee . Brown's legacy includes an award in his name presented to an Arkansas historian in the early stages of his or her career whose work focuses on Indians, women, or other groups underrepresented in books about the American West. Brown was a member of the American Library Association, Western Writers of America, and Organization of American Historians. Dee Brown died on December 12, 2002, at the age of ninety-four at his home in Little Rock. A memorial service was held at the main library of the Central Arkansas Library System, which has a branch library in Little Rock named for Brown. His remains are interred in Urbana, Illinois.
From the guide to the Dee Brown Collection, 1956, (Bowling Green State University - Browne Popular Culture Library)
