Harris: A Surname History (Paperback)

Description

Harris: A Surname History — Volume 29 of The Surname Histories Series. The son of Harry — a medieval patronymic from the English form of Henry — Harris stands #25 in the 2010 U.S. Census with 624,252 bearers, the fifth consecutive rank in the series’ running echo (Lee #21 → Pérez #22 → Thompson #23 → White #24 → Harris #25), and the southern twin of Harrison, the full -son form. The signature story is Joel Chandler Harris (1848–1908), the Georgia journalist who gave the world Uncle Remus and Brer Rabbit; a gallery of twenty remarkable bearers runs from Townsend Harris, America’s first consul to Japan, to Franco Harris of the Immaculate Reception, Julie Harris, Neil Patrick Harris, and Emmylou Harris; four lineage coats of arms — hedgehogs and crescents, drawn from the printed pages of Burke’s General Armory (1884) — show why no single coat of arms belongs to a surname; and a gazetteer of Harris places separates Harris County, Texas, from the Isle of Harris, which lent the name nothing but tweed.