Jeremiah Dixon
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Jeremiah Dixon (27 July 1733 – 22 January 1779) was an English surveyor and astronomer best known for surveying the Mason–Dixon line with Charles Mason from 1763 to 1767. The line came to mark the borders between Maryland, Pennsylvania and Delaware.<ref>Derek Howse, 'Dixon, Jeremiah (1733–1779)', Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 accessed 22 April 2013</ref><ref> Britannica, Mason-Dixon Line, historical political boundary [1] </ref>
Early life and education
Dixon was born in Cockfield, near Bishop Auckland, County Durham, in 1733, to an established Yorkshire family.<ref> The History and Antiquities of the County Palatine of Durham ..., Volume 1 </ref><ref> GRANTS AND CERTIFICATES OF ARMS. Communicated by Arthur J. Jf.wers, F.S.A. (Continued from f. 126.)
Djxon, George, of Ramshaw, co. Durham. Conf. by Richard St. George, Norro}', 14 Sept. 161 ?>. Gu. on a bend Or, betw. six plates three torteaux ; a chief Erinhiois. Crest — A cubit arm erect vested Gu., slashed Erminois, cuff Arg., in the hand ppr. a bezant. Stowe 714.Quoted in The Genealogist (1898), by Selby, Walford Dakin; Harwood, H.W. Forsyth; Murray, K.W. Pub. London, England: George Bell & Sons.Volume 14 [2] </ref> Dixon became interested in astronomy and mathematics during his education at John Kipling's Academy in Barnard Castle. Early in life he became acquaintanced with the eminent intellectuals of Southern Durham: mathematician William Emerson, and astronomers John Bird and Thomas Wright.
Mason-Dixon line
Dixon was recommended to assist Charles Mason in 1761, likely by astronomer John Bird, an active Fellow of the Royal Society. The Royal Society sent them to observe the transit of Venus from Sumatra. However, their passage to Sumatra was delayed, and they landed instead at the Cape of Good Hope where the transit was observed on 6 June 1761. Dixon returned to the Cape once again with Nevil Maskelyne's clock to work on experiments with gravity.
Dixon and Mason signed an agreement in 1763 with the proprietors of Pennsylvania and Maryland, Thomas Penn and Frederick Calvert, sixth Baron Baltimore, to assist with resolving a boundary dispute between the two provinces. They arrived in Philadelphia in November 1763 and began work towards the end of the year. The survey was not complete until late 1766, following which they stayed on to measure a degree of Earth's meridian on the Delmarva Peninsula in Maryland, on behalf of the Royal Society. The boundary between the states is 312 miles long, but Mason and Dixon only surveyed 240 miles, before they were driven away by hostile Indians in November 1767. The Mason-Dixon line later became the focal point for the American Civil War (1861–1865).
An anecdote recounts Jeremiah Dixon's views:
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Dixon and Mason also made a number of gravity measurements with the same instrument that Dixon had used with Maskelyne in 1761. Before returning to England in 1768, they were both admitted to the American Society for Promoting Useful Knowledge, in Philadelphia.<ref>Bell, Whitfield J., and Charles Greifenstein, Jr. Patriot-Improvers: Biographical Sketches of Members of the American Philosophical Society. 3 vols. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1997, I:367-68, 369–71, 525–29, III:111.</ref>
Other work
Dixon sailed to Norway in 1769 with William Bayly to observe another transit of Venus. The two split up, with Dixon at Hammerfest Island and Bayly at North Cape, in order to minimize the possibility of inclement weather obstructing their measurements. Following their return to England in July, Dixon resumed his work as a surveyor in Durham, surveying the park of Auckland Castle and Lanchester Common.
Dixon family of Cockfield
The Dixon family originated from the Dixons at Furness Fells, descending from Thomas Dixon, 1st Baron of Symondstone in the 13th century. Sir Nicholas Dixon (1390–1448) was born at High House, Furness Falls. His grandson, Sir John Dixon (1460–1550), was a government official under Henry VIII.
His grandson, George Dixon (1550–1631), of Ramshaw Hall, was collector of the Barony of Evenwood. He was granted arms in 1614, at the visitation of Richard St George.<ref>Pedigrees recorded at the visitations of the county palatine of Durham made by William Flower, Norroy king-of-arms, in 1575, by Richard St. George, Norroy king-of-arms, in 1615, and by William Dugdale, Norroy king-of-arms, in 1666 p. 108 [3]</ref>
George Dixon (1635–1707) was a Quaker by convincement, joining the Society of Friends "at its rise", an early follower of George Fox.<ref> Augusta Richardson's Reminiscences, citing Besse's Sufferings </ref>
George Dixon (1671–1752),<ref> Smith (1878) 'The Quaker Butler of Raby Castle', apparently in Darlington Reference Library </ref> was seneschal to Gilbert Vane, Second Baron Barnard at Raby Castle. He often refused to bring Lord Barnard more wine, if he drank excessively. Bemused by this curiosity, Baron Barnard's guests bet £200 that George would not refuse his master; when he did, they commissioned Sir Joshua Reynolds to paint a portrait of George "An Israelite indeed, in whom there is no guile" and a quote from Horace "Fortis & in seeps totes trees ate rotunds" ("strong to restrain immoderate desires, lightly esteeming public honours, a self-reliant and courteous man"). This was Jeremiah Dixon's great-uncle.
Sir George Fenwick Dixon (1701–1755), a coal mining magnate in Bishop Auckland and Cockfield married Mary Hunter, a native of Newcastle, "the cleverest woman" ever to marry into the Dixon family.<ref name="bionote">Jeremiah Dixon (1733–1779)-A Biographical Note</ref>
They had seven children, including Jeremiah Dixon and engineer and inventor George Dixon.
Jeremiah's great-nephew John Dixon worked on the Darlington Rocket with George Stephenson, in 1820. John Dixon's three nephews were also active: Sir Raylton Dixon, shipbuilding magnate and Mayor of Middlesbrough; the engineer John Dixon, who transported Cleopatra's Needle to London in 1877; and his brother Waynman Dixon was an engineer and Egyptologist at Giza, and later Honorary Consul to Japan in 1922.<ref>London Gazette, 1922 [4]</ref>
Death and legacy
Dixon died unmarried in Cockfield on 22 January 1779, at the age of 45, and was buried in an unmarked grave in the Quaker cemetery in Staindrop. Although he was recognised as a Quaker, he was known to violate rules by wearing a long red coat (possibly from the Royal Woolwich Academy) and occasionally drinking to excess.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> His nephew, John Dixon, came into possession of his "common theodolite", a work of George Adams. John's grandson, Edward, donated it to the Royal Geographical Society circa 1916.<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref> Dixon's name may be the origin for the nickname Dixie used in reference to the Southern United States.<ref name="WDL">Template:Cite web</ref>
Jeremiah Dixon is one of the two title characters of Thomas Pynchon's 1997 novel Mason & Dixon. The song Sailing to Philadelphia from Mark Knopfler's album of the same name, also refers to Mason and Dixon, and was inspired by Pynchon's book. An exhibition about the life and work of Jeremiah Dixon was mounted at the Bowes Museum in Barnard Castle in England in 2013. Titled Jeremiah Dixon: Scientist, Surveyor and Stargazer, it was scheduled to run from 27 April to 6 October. In September 2013, a locomotive operating on the Weardale Railway in County Durham was named after Jeremiah Dixon. The locomotive now operates in the Willesden area of northwest London.