Sketches of Alabama: Being an Account of the journey from Tuscaloosa to Blount Springs through Jefferson County on the Old Stage Roads, edited by Virginia Pounds Brown and Jane Porter Nabers by Mary Gordon Duffee

Sketches of Alabama: Being an Account of the journey from Tuscaloosa to Blount Springs through Jefferson County on the Old Stage Roads, edited by Virginia Pounds Brown and Jane Porter Nabers by Mary Gordon Duffee

Mary Gordon Duffee

1844-1930

Mary Gordon Duffee was born in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Her education included attending the Tuscaloosa Female Seminary and private schools in New York City. Throughout her life, she divided her time between Tuscaloosa, where her father owned the Washington House Tavern, and Blount Springs in Blount County, where he operated the Duffee House, a resort hotel. During the Civil War, she served as the postmistress for Blount Springs and was credited with spying for the Confederacy. After acting as hostess at the Duffee House until its unfortunate destruction by fire in 1869, Duffee pursued various writing endeavors. She spent time working for a New York newspaper before settling on Duffee's Mountain near Blount Springs after 1874. There, she engaged in freelance writing across a wide range of genres, including articles, sketches, poetry, advertising copy, and travel guidebooks. Duffee was a member of prestigious organizations such as the National Geographic Society, the American Historical and Biographical Society, and the New Orleans Academy of Sciences. She passed away in 1930.

Alabama Authors of the 19th & 20th Centuries, edited by Beverley Park Rilett, http://alabamaauthors.org

1970

Sketches of Alabama: Being an Account of the journey from Tuscaloosa to Blount Springs through Jefferson County on the Old Stage Roads, edited by Virginia Pounds Brown and Jane Porter Nabers. University, AL; University of Alabama, 1970 (based on a series of articles published in 1885 through 1887 in the Weekly Iron Age in Birmingham).

AL Book Collection

Duffee, Mary Gordon, “Sketches of Alabama: Being an Account of the journey from Tuscaloosa to Blount Springs through Jefferson County on the Old Stage Roads, edited by Virginia Pounds Brown and Jane Porter Nabers by Mary Gordon Duffee,” Alabama Authors of the 19th & 20th Centuries, accessed November 8, 2026, https://alabamaauthors.org/items/show/24735.