Vine Street was the main thoroughfare through Cahawba. During the town’s later incarnation as a cotton port, shops and businesses lined the street, alongside the Dallas County Courthouse. The buildings are gone, but the street is still lined with Chinaberry trees. A town statute required all residents to plant the trees for shade. (Robin McDonald) The eventful summer of constitution making behind it, Alabama’s state legislature opened its first session on October 25, 1819, in Huntsville. Gov. William Wyatt Bibb attempted to impress upon the legislators the solemnity of the occasion in a written address read to the body at its commencement by observing the gathering would “form a memorable epoch in our history…you cannot estimate too highly the great interests committed to your charge, or the important consequences which may flow from your deliberations.”
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