Obituary: Mary Jane Phillips Dickerson, 1937-2024 

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• Courtesy
• Mary Jane Dickerson

Mary Jane Phillips Dickerson died peacefully in her Jericho Center, Vt., home on Thursday, October 3, 2024, of heart and lung disease. Born on September 29, 1937, to Angus Peter Phillips, a merchant farmer, and Sue Sherrill Phillips, a schoolteacher, Mary Jane was raised in the village of Cameron in the Sandhills of North Carolina. During her childhood in this close-knit farming community, Mary Jane developed a passion for gardening and a keen appreciation for small-town lore that eventually led to her fascination with William Faulkner’s Yoknapatawpha novels and a career as a college English teacher and poet.

Mary Jane earned an undergraduate degree in English and history in 1959 at what was then the Woman’s College of the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. There she began to write poems in creative writing classes with Randall Jarrell, who steered her toward writing about her native North Carolina Sandhills. Mary Jane went on to earn a master’s degree in English at the University of North Carolina in summer 1960. At Chapel Hill, she went on a legendary first date to a Robert Frost reading with a lean, witty and diffident fellow graduate student from Vermont, A. Inskip Dickerson Jr., whom she would marry in 1961. They lived in Chapel Hill, where Mary Jane continued graduate study in English part time with the births of their children, Bert and Ann Meigs, in 1962 and 1965, while Skip completed his doctoral studies. They moved to Vermont in 1966 for Skip’s position as an assistant professor in English at the University of Vermont and to Jericho Center in 1968, where they bought a dilapidated brick farmhouse in the center of town, whose renovation and landscaping became their shared labor of love.

From the beginning of her time in Vermont, Mary Jane — an elegant and refined feminist from the South who embraced all that Vermont had to offer — cut a striking figure. She contributed tirelessly to the English department’s program during her 34-year career at the University of Vermont, where she served as the director of freshman English, associate director of writing and, in 1996, associate professor of English. Mary Jane developed courses in women’s autobiography and African American literature (UVM’s first) on the undergraduate and graduate levels. In 1997, she was awarded the George V. Kidder Outstanding Faculty Award and was thrilled to be invited in her final years of teaching to Japan and South Africa as a visiting scholar. In 2016, she was inducted as a fellow in the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Though a prolific writer and a dedicated teacher, Mary Jane most loved mentoring young writers, which she continued to do until shortly before she died.

Skip’s untimely death in 1995 helped Mary Jane decide to take an early retirement in 2000 to have plenty of time for her family, friends, travel, and creative and civic interests. During her long and robust retirement, she taught regular classes on reading and writing poetry at local libraries and was a writer/faculty member at the New England Young Writers’ Conference at Breadloaf; published two volumes of poetry; served on numerous boards and committees, including the Deborah Rawson Memorial Library in Underhill, Vt., and the Fleming Museum board; and participated in civic work with the Democratic Party and in her beloved Jericho Center as an elected justice of the peace, treasurer of the Jericho Preservation Association and a Jericho Democratic Caucus member. Perhaps her proudest accomplishment in retirement was cofounding Sundog Poetry, whose mission is to support Vermont poets.

Mary Jane’s zest for life, empathy, eloquence and generous spirit made a powerful impression on those who were lucky enough to know her. Her gardens, cultivated with care and imagination over 56 years, reflect her magnificent aesthetic sense that seemed to radiate from her at all times. She championed her children and grandchildren in all of their endeavors, valuing each child’s particular talents and interests with equal enthusiasm. Even during her most difficult days at the end of her life, Mary Jane maintained a profound sense of gratitude for all of her blessings. Her survivors include her sister, Ann Phillips McCracken of Sanford, N.C.; son, Albert I. Dickerson (Sarah) of Huntington, Vt., and their children, Angus Dickerson (Hannah) of Huntington and Mary Jo of Santa Fe, N.M.; daughter, Ann Meigs Dickerson (Azzam Elayan) of Hillsborough, N.J., and their children, Adam and Leila Elayan; nieces Sherrill McCracken and son Jack Richardson, Sarah McCracken Cobb (Ken) and daughters Rebecca and Caroline (Donovan), and Mary Ann McCracken Compton (Will) and their children, James Webb (Ginny), Peter and daughter Anna; brother-in-law, Gregory Dickerson (Deena); nephew, Greg Dickerson (Marguerite), and their children, Lily and Ben; and niece Kirsten Dickerson and her daughter, Charlotte.

To make a charitable donation in Mary Jane’s honor, please consider Sundog Poetry, or the Mary Jane Dickerson Scholarship fund at the University of Vermont. Checks may be addressed to the UVM Foundation (with Mary Jane Dickerson English Department Scholarship Fund written in the memo line), Grasse Mount, 411 Main St., Burlington, VT 05401.

A celebration of Mary Jane’s life will be held on Saturday, October 26, 2024, noon, at her Jericho home.