Arthenia Jackson Bates Millican’s life and work now span 87 years, bridging a wide range of events and experiences.

Born in 1920 in Sumter, South Carolina to Susan Emma David Jackson and Calvin Shepherd Jackson, she attended Savage Glover grade school, and graduated from Lincoln High in 1937. Millican's early career was as a teacher and department head in South Carolina and Virginia public schools. She finished Morris College in Sumter, South Carolina, in 1941, earned a master's degree from Atlanta University in 1948, and earned a PhD from Louisiana State University in 1972, writing a dissertation on James weld on Johnson, “In Quest of an Afro Centric Tradition for Black American Literature.”This was a long-deferred dream. While in Atlanta, she studied the art of poetry writing with Langston Hughes.

Arthenia lived her life bridging the distinctions that often separate the intellectual from the natural and intuitive, the mind from the heart and the academic from the commonplace concerns of ordinary people. Her work spanned poetry, narrative and discourse, bridging reality into creativity. And her heart embraced and bridged cultures, classes, time and place.

Writing from a life of rich diversity, she is often compared with Paul Laurence Dunbar, Zora Neale Hurston, and Edward Gaines. She reflected her broad and intriguing life experience in words that continue to move and engage us today, a quarter to a half century after she first shared her visions with us.

Arthenia's first poem was published when she was only sixteen. A protégé of Langston Hughes, she went on to write poems and prose, fiction and non-fiction, articles, reports, letters, and book reviews over the course of her lifetime. Her short works have appeared in the National Poetry Anthology, Essence Magazine, The College Language Association Journal, The Negro Digest, Black World, Obsidian, and many others. She was a contributing editor for “James Baldwin, A Critical Evaluation”, and “Sturdy Black Bridges, A Vision of Black Women in Literature”.

Her prominent published works are:

• Seeds Beneath the Snow (Greenwich Book Publishers, 1969 and Howard University Press, 1975) a collection of 12 short stories based on life in the South.
• The Deity Nodded (Harlo Press, 1973) a novel based on a young women's search for truth which leads to a conflict between Islam and Christianity.
• Such Things from the Valley (publisher, 1977) a second volume of short stories
• Hand on the Throttle: Touchstones in the Life of Lionel Lee, Sr., Volume 1: Holding On (biography), 1993.

Arthenia Bates Millican returned to her hometown of Sumter, South Carolina in 1992. Today she lives a quiet life not far from where she was born. Her vibrant mind and creative spark have dimmed, but her heart is as embracing as ever.

Career

Arthenia Millican's teaching career spanned the years 1942 to 1980. She taught at several high schools in South Carolina, Virginia and Mississippi, before moving to the college level. Her university level positions included Morris College, Sumter, SC, chair of English department, 1947-1949; Mississippi Valley State University, instructor in English, 1955-1956; Southern University, Baton Rouge, LA, instructor, assistant professor, associate professor, professor of English, 1956-1974; Norfolk State College, Norfolk, VA, professor of English, 1974-1977; Southern University, professor of English and creative writing, 1977-1980. She retired in 1980 from Southern University

Education

• Doctor of Philosophy, 1972, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA.
• Graduate Study: 1955, 1958; University of Michigan.
• Graduate Study: 1953, North Carolina Central University.
• Master of Arts, 1948, Atlanta University, Atlanta, GA.
• Bachelor of Arts, 1941, Morris College, Sumter, SC.
• Creative writing workshop lead by Langston Hughes at Atlanta University, Atlanta, GA, 1947.
• Deep South Writer's Conference, June 1965, 1966, and 1970.
• Chautaugua Writer's Workshop, July 1962.