Dr. James Pleasant Atkinson was born July 21, 1861, in Macedonia, Columbia County, the son of Capt. J.H. Atkinson and Nancy Jane Harris Atkinson, and the grandson of Robert E. Atkinson who came from Georgia and settled near College Hill in 1845. His father left home to enlist in the Confederate army three days after the son's birth.

​

     Dr. Atkinson received his education at the Presbyterian Academy at Mt. Holly and at the academy at Falcon. He took his medical course at the University of Louisville, Kentucky, and began practicing in Southern Columbia County in 1882. He continued his practice there until 1900 and became one of the best-known physicians in the county.

In 1900 he moved to the newly-opened Indian Territory in Boswell. He remained there until 1904 when he returned to Bodcaw, Arkansas where he continued to practice until a few months before his death.

​

     He married Miss Elizabeth Strickland in 1889, To them were born six children: William Henry, James Dawson Atkinson, Mrs. Carl C. Mitchell, Mrs. R.D. May, Mattie Atkinson, and Mary Atkinson.

​

      Dr. James passed away aged 80 in the family home in Bodcaw on Saturday, Oct. 11, 1941. He was buried in the family plot in the Shover Springs cemetery.

​

     James Dawson Atkinson, son of the above Dr. Atkinson, was married June 22, 1919 to June Volway (b, 1898 in Saginaw, Michigan), daughter of Charles Henry Volway and his wife, Mary (Meyer) Volway, natives of Saginaw who moved to Prescott, Arkansas in 1910. Children of James Dawson Atkinson and his wife, June Volway, were:

​

Dawson Atkinson jr. born February 28, 1926

Mary Edith Atkinson, born December 28, 1927

Catherine Elizabeth Atkinson, born December 22, 1928