ALABAMA HERITAGE
  • Magazine
    • Current and Back Issues >
      • Back Issues 141-150 >
        • Issue 147, Winter 2023
        • Issue 146, Fall 2022
        • Issue 145, Summer 2022
        • Issue 144, Spring 2022
        • Issue 143, Winter 2022
        • Issue 142, Fall 2021
        • Issue 141, Summer 2021
      • Back Issues 131-140 >
        • Issue 140, Spring 2021
        • Issue 139, Winter 2021
        • Issue 138, Fall 2020
        • Issue 137, Summer 2020
        • Issue 136, Spring 2020
        • Issue 135, Winter 2020
        • Issue 134, Fall 2019
        • Issue 133, Summer 2019
        • Issue 132 Spring 2019
        • Issue 131, Winter 2019
      • Back Issues 121-130 >
        • Issue 130, Fall 2018
        • Issue 129, Summer 2018
        • Issue 128, Spring 2018
        • Issue 127, Winter 2018
        • Issue 126, Fall 2017
        • Issue 125 Summer 2017
        • Issue 124, Spring 2017
        • Issue 123, Winter 2017
        • Issue 122, Fall 2016
        • Issue 121, Summer 2016
      • Back Issues 111-120 >
        • Issue 120, Spring 2016
        • Issue 119, Winter 2016
        • Issue 118, Fall 2015
        • Issue 117, Summer 2015
        • Issue 116, Spring 2015
        • Issue 115, Winter 2015
        • Issue 114, Fall 2014
        • Issue 113, Summer 2014
        • Issue 112, Spring 2014
        • Issue 111, Winter 2014
      • Back Issues 101-110 >
        • Issue 110, Fall 2013
        • Issue 109, Summer 2013
        • Issue 108, Spring 2013
        • Issue 107, Winter 2013
        • Issue 106, Fall 2012
        • Issue 105, Summer 2012
        • Issue 104, Spring 2012
        • Issue 103, Winter 2012
        • Issue 102, Fall 2011
        • Issue 101, Summer 2011
      • Back Issues 91-100 >
        • Issue 100, Spring 2011
        • Issue 99, Winter 2011
        • Issue 98, Fall 2010
        • Issue 97, Summer 2010
        • Issue 96, Spring 2010
        • Issue 95, Winter 2010
        • Issue 94, Fall 2009
        • Issue 93, Summer 2009
        • Issue 92, Spring 2009
        • Issue 91, Winter 2009
      • Back Issues 81-90 >
        • Issue 90, Fall 2008
        • Issue 89, Summer 2008
        • Issue 88, Spring 2008
        • Issue 87, Winter 2008
        • Issue 86, Fall 2007
        • Issue 85, Summer 2007
        • Issue 84, Spring 2007
        • Issue 83, Winter 2007
        • Issue 82, Fall 2006
        • Issue 81, Summer 2006
      • Back Issues 71-80 >
        • Issue 80, Spring 2006
        • Issue 79, Winter 2006
        • Issue 78, Fall 2005
        • Issue 77, Summer 2005
        • Issue 76, Spring 2005
        • Issue 75, Winter 2005
        • Issue 74, Fall 2004
        • Issue 73, Summer 2004
        • Issue 72, Spring 2004
        • Issue 71, Winter 2004
      • Back Issues 61-70 >
        • Issue 70, Fall 2003
        • Issue 69, Summer 2003
        • Issue 68, Spring 2003
        • Issue 67, Winter 2003
        • Issue 66, Fall 2002
        • Issue 65, Summer 2002
        • Issue 64, Spring 2002
        • Issue 63, Winter 2002
        • Issue 62, Fall 2001
        • Issue 61, Summer 2001
      • Back Issues 51-60 >
        • Issue 60, Spring 2001
        • Issue 59, Winter 2001
        • Issue 58, Fall 2000
        • Issue 57, Summer 2000
        • Issue 56, Spring 2000
        • Issue 55, Winter 2000
        • Issue 54, Fall 1999
        • Issue 53, Summer 1999
        • Issue 52, Spring 1999
        • Issue 51, Winter 1999
      • Back Issues 41-50 >
        • Issue 50, Fall 1998
        • Issue 49, Summer 1998
        • Issue 48, Spring 1998
        • Issue 47, Winter 1998
        • Issue 46, Fall 1997
        • Issue 45, Summer 1997
        • Issue 44, Spring 1997
        • Issue 43, Winter 1997
        • Issue 42, Fall 1996
        • Issue 41, Summer 1996
      • Back Issues 31-40 >
        • Issue 40, Spring 1996
        • Issue 39, Winter 1996
        • Issue 38, Fall 1995
        • Issue 37, Summer 1995
        • Issue 36, Spring 1995
        • Issue 35, Winter 1995
        • Issue 34, Fall 1994
        • Issue 33, Summer 1994
        • Issue 32, Spring 1994
        • Issue 31, Winter 1994
      • Back Issues 21-30 >
        • Issue 30, Fall 1993
        • Issue 29, Summer 1993
        • Issue 28, Spring 1993
        • Issue 27, Winter 1993
        • Issue 26, Fall 1992
        • Issue 25, Summer 1992
        • Issue 24, Spring 1992
        • Issue 23, Winter 1992
        • Issue 22, Fall 1991
        • Issue 21, Summer 1991
      • Back Issues 11-20 >
        • Issue 20, Spring 1991
        • Issue 19, Winter 1991
        • Issue 18, Fall 1990
        • Issue 17, Summer 1990
        • Issue 16, Spring 1990
        • Issue 15, Winter 1990
        • Issue 14, Fall 1989
        • Issue 13, Summer 1989
        • Issue 12, Spring 1989
        • Issue 11, Winter 1989
      • Back Issues 1-10 >
        • Issue 10, Fall 1988
        • Issue 9, Summer 1988
        • Issue 8, Spring 1988
        • Issue 7, Winter 1988
        • Issue 6, Fall 1987
        • Issue 5, Summer 1987
        • Issue 4, Spring 1987
        • Issue 3, Winter 1987
        • Issue 2, Fall 1986
        • Issue 1, Summer 1986
    • Digital Features
    • Links of Interest
    • Bonus Materials >
      • Adventures in Genealogy
      • Alabama Heritage Blog
      • Alabama Territory
      • Becoming Alabama >
        • Creek War Era
        • Civil War Era
        • Civil Rights Movement
      • From the Vault
      • History in Ruins
      • Places in Peril
      • Recipes
  • Online Store
    • Customer Service
  • About Us
    • Awards
    • Meet Our Team
    • News
    • Writer's Guidelines and Submissions
  • Search
  • Donate
Published by The University of Alabama,
The University of Alabama at Birmingham,
and the Alabama Department of Archives and History
Alabama Heritage, Issue 105, Summer 2012
Issue 105, Summer 2012
Buy This Issue
Start Your Subscription
Give a Gift Subscription
On the cover: Moundville mural. (Alabama Archives and History Foundation; Illustration by Karen Carr)

FEATURE  ABSTRACTS


Picture"The First Alabamians" conveys the richness
of Indian culture during the Mississippian period.
(Robin McDonald)
Voices from the Past: The New Museum of Alabama Takes Shape

By Steve Murray

For decades the Alabama Department of Archives and History (ADAH) has educated citizens of all ages on the diverse history of the land that makes up our state. By late 2013, the ADAH will have another significant resource to help in this mission. Called the Museum of Alabama, this series of exhibits will delineate a range of significant periods in Alabama’s history, giving visitors a new understanding of such topics as “The Land of Alabama,” “The First Alabamians,” “Alabama Voices,” and “Alabama Treasures.” The ADAH has also worked carefully to tie these exhibits to the state’s educational curriculum, offering schoolchildren from across Alabama the chance to encounter artifacts from the periods they are studying. Although several phases of the museum have already been completed, the remaining phases are still underway. Readers of Alabama Heritagecan help make the Museum of Alabama a reality by making a tax-deductible contribution to the Alabama Archives and History Foundation, P.O. Box 300100, Montgomery, AL 36130.

Buy This Feature

Additional Information
For further information on the ADAH or the Museum of Alabama, please visit their website. 

About the Author
Steve Murray is Assistant Director for Administration at the Alabama Department of Archives and History (ADAH). Prior to joining ADAH in 2006, he was managing editor of the Encyclopedia of Alabama andThe Alabama Review. He is a past president of the Alabama Historical Association and serves on the Council of the Alabama Museums Association. 
Back to Top

PictureJacques Lajonie's map of concessions
granted to French colonists.
(Nicole Sauvage)
Letters from Exile

By Éric Saugera


Editor’s Note: Readers may remember Rafe Blaufarb’s article “Alabama’s Vine and Olive Colony: Myth and Fact” in our Summer 2006 issue. In that article, Blaufarb introduced readers to the history of Alabama’s Vine and Olive Colony,a nineteenth-century settlement by French exiles in Marengo County. The exiles fled France in 1817, after Napoleon was deposed, and Congress granted them lands in Alabama to begin planting grape vines and olive trees. With Blaufarb’s article, former Alabama Heritage editor Suzanne Wolfe informed readers about an intriguing discovery of letters that were written from Demopolis by one of the colonists. In our new article, Éric Saugera, the historian who found the letters in France and author of Reborn in America, a new history of the Vine and Olive Colony, brings to life the story of their author, Jacques Lajonie, and reveals new details about daily life in the colony.

When a toothache led French historian Éric Saugera to the dentist, he little expected to discover a fascinating history of an Alabama colony. But that’s exactly what happened. Saugera’s dentist shared a trove of letters his ancestors, who lived for a time as exiles in Alabama’s Vine and Olive Colony, sent from the states back to France. Written by Jacques Lajonie, whose loyalty to Napoleon proved dangerous after the emperor’s fall from power, the letters offer a rare glimpse of life on the Alabama frontier and the struggles of pursuing an agrarian life in a land far from home. They also reveal new connections between Alabama and France, showing common threads between these distinct nations.

Buy This Feature
Additional Information 
For more information about Éric Saugera’s Reborn in America French Exiles and Refugees in the United States and the Vine and Olive Adventure, 1815-1865, please visit the University of Alabama Press site.

Encyclopedia of Alabama: Vine and Olive Colony

About the Author 
Éric Saugera, Ph.D., is a French historian born in Brittany, in western France, in 1952. He currently lives in Nantes. A specialist in the study of the French slave trade in the nineteenth century, he has since 1985 published many articles and books on the subject. His Bordeaux, port négrier (1995) has become a classic. While doing research for this work, he discovered the letters that Jacques Lajonie, a former officer in Napoleon’s army and in exile in Demopolis, Alabama, wrote to his family and friends between 1817 and 1829. Thanks to the support of Atlanta attorney Bradley Hale and Gwyn Turner of Demopolis, Éric Saugera was able to live in Demopolis from 2002 to 2004 to follow, two centuries later, the steps of Jacques Lajonie. 
Back to Top

PictureGeorge and Cornelia Wallace
(Alabama Department of Archives and History)
Awaiting Justice: “Scottsboro Boy” Clarence Norris

By Thomas Reidy

Known as the “Scottsboro Boys,” the group of young African American men arrested in Paint Rock, Alabama, in 1931 received a criminal conviction many Americans questioned. Upon his parole fifteen years later, “Scottsboro Boy” Clarence Norris went into hiding, certain that he would never be treated fairly by the Alabama legal system. And for many decades, his certainty appeared well-founded. In the 1970s, though, the state’s social and political landscape had shifted substantially, and Norris received a long-hoped-for but never-expected pardon. Author Thomas Reidy details the events that led to this legal decision and updates readers on current efforts to commemorate the “Scottsboro Boys.” 

Additional Information 
For more resources connected to the “Scottsboro Boys” story, please see the Scottsboro Boys Museum and Cultural Center website. 

Encyclopedia of Alabama: Scottsboro Boys

About the Author
Thomas Reidy is a doctoral candidate at the University of Alabama. He is currently writing a dissertation on antebellum professionals in Alabama from 1800 to 1860. Reidy is a part-time instructor at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, where he has taught courses in world history, Western civilization, and American history since 2007. In addition, Reidy works with the University’s New College, supporting the efforts of the Scottsboro Boys Museum and Cultural Center. He is a past recipient of the Frank Lawrence Owsley Award for outstanding competency in history and winner of the Friends of the Alabama Department of Archives and History Fellowship in 2010. “Awaiting Justice” is Reidy’s second publication in Alabama Heritage. His article featuring antebellum doctor Thomas Fearn appeared in the magazine’s Spring 2012 issue. 


Back to Top

PictureThe Gulf Shores Hangout
(Mobile Press-Register collection,
Doy Leale McCall Rare Book
and Manuscript Library,
University of South Alabama)
The Rise and Decline of Alabama’s Redneck Riviera

By Harvey H. Jackson III

Although we now consider spring break at the beach as common a paring as peanut butter and jelly, this tradition of coastal vacations was not always so ingrained in cultural norms. Like everything else, it originated somewhere, and Harvey Jackson’s article details that origin story, weaving together a colorful cast of characters that includes former University of Alabama quarterback Ken Stabler, writer Howell Raines, and a fish (or is it a bird?) called mullet. If you’ve ever sipped a beverage under the lingerie-draped eaves of the Flora-Bama, this article is for you. 

About the Author
Harvey H. Jackson III is Eminent Scholar in History at Jacksonville State University. This article is based on material used in the writing of his book, The Rise and Decline of the Redneck Riviera: An Insider’s History of the Florida-Alabama Coast, which was published in 2012 by the University of Georgia Press. Portions of this article have appeared in various forms in “The Rise and Decline of the Redneck Riviera: The Northern Rim of the Gulf Coast since World War II,” Southern Cultures, Spring 2010, and in articles and columns by the author that were published in the Anniston Star, Longleaf Style, and the Mobile Press-Register. 


Back to Top

DEPARTMENT  Abstracts


PictureAn original mantel
(Robert Gamble)
Southern Architecture and Preservation:
A Landmark Revived

By Mary Riser

When author Mary Riser started looking for a country house, she little suspected that she would find it in an abandoned building. However, with the help of two ardent preservationists—Riser’s mother, former state senator Ann Bedsole, and architect Nicholas Holmes Jr.—Riser discovered that sometimes even the roughest structure can be rehabilitated and restored. In this quarter’s installment of the Southern Architecture and Preservation department, Riser details how she bestowed new life on an abandoned Clarke County hunting camp and preserved a piece of Alabama’s architectural landscape. 

About the Author
Mary Riser, a former teacher at the University of South Alabama and Spring Hill College, currently works on documentaries. Robert Gamble, standing editor of the “Southern Architecture and Preservation” department of Alabama Heritage, is senior architectural historian for the Alabama Historical Commission.


Back to Top

PictureMinnie Pearl joins the Wallace campaign trail
(Alabama Department of Archives and History)
Becoming Alabama:
Quarter by Quarter

By Joseph W. Pearson, Megan L. Bever, and Matthew L. Downs


Editor’s Note: Alabama Heritage, the Summersell Center for Study of the South, the University of Alabama Department of History, and the Alabama Tourism Department offer this department as a part of the statewide "Becoming Alabama" initiative—a cooperative venture of state organizations to commemorate Alabama’s experiences related to the Creek War, the Civil War, and the civil rights movement. Quarter by quarter we will take you to the corresponding seasons 200, 150, and 50 years ago—sometimes describing pivotal events, sometimes describing daily life, but always illuminating a world in flux. We will wait for the ultimate outcomes as our forebears did—over time. For those joining the story in progress, you can find earlier quarters on our website. 

This quarter’s “Becoming Alabama” articles trace events that had effects on Alabama and the world beyond. Joseph Pearson discusses the start of the War of 1812, showing how many Creeks and white settlers in the Mississippi Territory concurred in their enthusiasm for what they believed to be a “second war of independence.” Covering the Civil War era, Megan Bever charts the crucial role of ammunition and materiel, showing how Josiah Gorgas, as the Confederate States of America’s Chief of Ordnance, helped aid the southern war effort. Finally, Matthew Downs revisits the summer of 1962, when two candidates vied to become Alabama’s next governor. 

About the Authors
Joseph W. Pearson is a PhD student in the Department of History at the University of Alabama. His research interests include the nineteenth-century South, antebellum politics, and political culture. 

Megan L. Bever is currently a doctoral student in the Department of History at the University of Alabama. Her research interests include the nineteenth-century South and the Civil War in American culture. 

Matthew L. Downs (PhD, Alabama) is an adjunct professor of history at Birmingham-Southern College. His dissertation focused on the federal government’s role in the economic development of the Tennessee Valley. 


Back to Top

PictureA first edition of
"What Mrs. Fisher Knows about Old Southern Cooking"
(W.S. Hoole Special Collections Library,
The University of Alabama)
Revealing Hidden Collections:
“What Mrs. Fisher Knows about Cooking”: Samplings of Alabama’s Contributions to America’s Foodways

By Louis A. Pitschmann

In this new department, Alabama Heritage explores from the state’s libraries, museums, and private collections, bringing to light little-known treasures. In this initial installment, the department’s standing editor, Louis Pitschmann, discusses the Lupton Collection, a rare assortment of African American cookbooks held at the W. S. Hoole Special Collections Library at the University of Alabama. Reading through the cookbooks, one gathers a sense of how African American cooks, particularly those from Alabama, have influenced what we now consider traditional American fare. 

About the Author
Louis A. Pitschmann, standing editor of the “Revealing Hidden Collections” department of Alabama Heritage, is Dean of the University Libraries at the University of Alabama and director of the Alabama Center for the Book, which co-sponsor this department.



Back to Top

PictureSidney J. Catts
(Library of Congress)
Southern Religion:
Anti-Catholicism in Alabama and Florida in the Early Twentieth Century

By Arthur Remillard

When one thinks of intolerance, generally issues of racial prejudice come to mind. However, many people fail to realize that for a number of years, many southerners held a bias against Catholicism. As the twentieth century dawned, anti-Catholicism gained prominence as a political stance, and it eventually filtered into personal belief systems as well. However, following a Methodist minister’s 1916 murder of a Catholic priest, many Alabamians decided things had to change. Arthur Remillard revisits the death of Father James E. Coyle and considers its continued influence on Alabama.

Additional Information
Encyclopedia of Alabama: Father Coyle

About the Author
Arthur Remillard is assistant professor of religious studies at Saint Francis University (Loretto, PA). He is the author of Southern Civil Religions: Imagining the Good Society in the Post–Reconstruction Era(University of Georgia Press, 2011) and the book review editor for theJournal of Southern Religion. Joshua D. Rothman, standing editor of the “Southern Religion” department of Alabama Heritage, is associate professor of history at the University of Alabama and director of the university’s Frances S. Summersell Center for the Study of the South, which sponsors this department.

Back to Top

PictureDespite efforts to remove it, the alligator population perists at
the Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge.
(George Ponder)
Recollections:
The Tennessee Valley: Gator Country?

By Thomas V. Ress

Although the American Alligator commonly appears in warm climates such as Florida, its historical range is much broader—a fact that many visitors to Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge in the Tennessee Valley learn firsthand. The reptiles have a complicated history at the site, though their presence dates back at least forty years. Through their decades at the refuge, the alligators have sparked a number of reactions among nearby residents, causing both excitement and fear. Thomas Ress evaluates the alligators’ presence, positing possible sources for it and discussing how we might come to coexist comfortably with these creatures.

Additional Information
To learn more about Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge, please visit its website.

About the Author
Thomas V. Ress is a freelance writer who resides in Athens, Alabama. He writes about adventure, outdoor destinations, and Alabama history.




Back to Top

PictureThe "Striking Tower Clock"
on the Alabama State Capitol
(Robin McDonald)
Alabama Treasures:
Paul Revere and the Alabama Capitol’s Striking Tower Clock

By Thomas Kaufmann

In 1852 Montgomery’s capitol building gained a lovely addition: a striking tower clock. Today, the piece stands as a rare example of the art of American clock making. As author Thomas Kaufmann explains, the structure also links Alabama’s capitol to one of the preeminent figures in American history—Paul Revere. 

About the Author
Thomas Kaufmann is a Montgomery artist and preservationist. For more information, please visit his website. 

Author’s Note
Many thanks to the Alabama Department of Archives & History, Revere bell scholars and authors Edwin and Evelyn Stickney, Patrick M. Leehey of the Paul Revere Museum–Boston, John Eachus of John Eachus and Associates, First Church in Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts - Unitarian Universalist, and David W. Graf Tower Clock Repair and Restoration, for generously sharing their expert knowledge, scholarship, & research on The Capitol Clock, Howard & Davis Boston, and the Revere/Hooper/Blake Foundry. 


Read the entire article here as a downloadable PDF. 

Back to Top

Picture
Picture
Picture
Reading the Southern Past:
The Tuskegee Syphilis Study

By Stephen J. Goldfarb


In this quarter’s installment, Stephen Goldfarb surveys several books on the infamous Tuskegee Syphilis Study, in which scientists charted the effects of the disease on infected African American men. Goldfarb reviews Bad Blood: The Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment by James Jones (Simon & Schuster, 1993); Examining Tuskegee: The Infamous Syphilis Study and Its Legacy by Susan M. Reverby (University of North Carolina Press, 2009); and The Tuskegee Syphilis Study: The Real Story and Beyond by Fred D. Gray (NewSouth Books, 2002). Taken together, these texts offer a comprehensive appraisal of the study’s purpose and conclusions, along with its moral implications and efforts made to atone for it. 

About the Author
Stephen Goldfarb holds a PhD in the history of science and technology. He retired from a public library in 2003. 
Back to Top
Online Store
​Customer Service
Meet Our Team
Board of Directors
Corporate Sponsors
News
Join Our Email List

Employment
UA Disclaimer
UA Privacy Policy ​
​Website comments or questions?  

Email ah.online@ua.edu
Published by The University of Alabama, The University of Alabama at Birmingham, and the Alabama Department of Archives and History
​Alabama Heritage
Box 870342
Tuscaloosa, AL 35487
Local: (205) 348-7467
Toll-Free: (877) 925-2323
Fax: (205) 348-7473

alabama.heritage@ua.edu