Jr. Thomas Dixon

Born near Shelby, North Carolina, in 1864, Thomas Dixon Jr. moved through several careers over his lifetime, including Baptist ministry, law, politics, lecturing, and writing. He studied at Wake Forest and Johns Hopkins, served in the North Carolina legislature while still young, and later turned his energy toward public speaking and fiction.

Dixon wrote novels and plays that reached a large audience in the early 20th century. He is remembered most for The Leopard's Spots and The Clansman, works that promoted white supremacist ideas and presented the Ku Klux Klan in a sympathetic light. Because of that, his writing is now read as much for its historical impact as for its literary place.

His influence extended beyond books. The Clansman became the basis for D. W. Griffith's 1915 film The Birth of a Nation, which greatly expanded the reach of Dixon's ideas and remains deeply controversial. He died in Raleigh, North Carolina, in 1946.