The Texas Fashion Collection announces the addition of a new resource, a collection of fashion illustrations and clippings from the Dunham family.  Mary Helen Holden Dunham’s fashion illustrations shed a light on early Dallas fashion history.  Howard Dunham and his wife Joyce graciously donated examples of Mary Helen Holden Dunham’s work to the Texas Fashion Collection.  Mary Dunham was a talented young woman who worked as a fashion artist for A. Harris & Co, a Dallas department store that predates Neiman Marcus.

A. Harris & Co. relied on the abilities of young artists, such as Mary Dunham to work in the rushed and fast-pace world of fashion and competition with other stores.  Dunham, a Dallas native, was well-educated.  She earned a Bachelor of Science in Architecture from the University of Texas, and studied at Parsons, and Fountainebleau in Paris.  As a young woman, Dunham worked for A. Harris & Co. as a fashion artist for a period of years in the 1920s.

Adolph Harris came from Prussia to Texas through Galveston in 1859 and set up a dry goods store in 1862.  Harris maintained a store in some form, with a variation of names until 1891, when A. Harris & Co. was formed in Dallas.  Carrie Marcus Neiman was an assistant buyer for Harris & Co. and she actually met her future husband Abraham Neiman at the A. Harris & Co. department store. Although Adolph Harris passed away in 1912 on a buying trip to New York, A. Harris & Co. remained family owned and controlled until 1961 when A. Harris & Co. merged with Sanger Brothers. On the TV show Dallas, the character, Pamela Barnes Ewing worked at “The Store” and it is rumored that “The Store” was Sanger-Harris.

Howard and Joyce Dunham Gift to the Texas Fashion Collection

Created by Jamie Martin Alter as part of her Summer 2010 Internship for the Texas Fashion Collection.