Issue 8, Spring 1988
On the cover: Tea-servers kept Chinese laborers in Reconstruction Alabama supplied with their favorite beverage. [Courtesy The Historical New Orleans Collection, Museum/Research Center, Acc. No. 1953.80. Tinting by Jan Pruitt]
Features
Chinese Laborers in Reconstruction Alabama
By Daniel Liestman
In the years following the Civil War, Alabama embarked on what some called “the Chinese experiment.” For the experiment’s most optimistic proponents, the idea was simple and sure: Import inexpensive Chinese workers to redress the dire labor shortages the state was suffering after the Civil War and use Chinese immigrants to rebuild plantations and to construct railroads, thereby resuscitating the state’s lifeless post-war economy at the least possible cost. For the most part, the plan did not work. In this article, Daniel Liestman examines the plan, the thinking behind it, and the reasons for its failure.
Gunboat Quilts
By Bryding Adams Henley
In mid-February 1862, the Mobile Register and Advertiser published a letter from “A Southern Woman” who wished to appeal to the patriotism of Southern women in general and Alabama women in particular, all of whom, she said, should begin raising money for the cause of the Confederacy. This particular Southern woman had as her goal the creation of a gunboat to defend the City of Mobile. To this end, the woman was willing to contribute “her mite of less than five dollars” which she had “earned by her needle.” Thus began the inspiration for a statewide campaign in Alabama to raise money for what came to be known as the Women’s Gunboat Fund.
Outlaws, Cat’s-Paws, and Spotters
By Rhoda Coleman Ellison
A century ago, crime flourished in the central Alabama backwoods. Thieves made their raids from the rough hill country, afterwards retiring safely among protective family and friends. Their primary object was to seize livestock and cotton, but theft sometimes led to violence. The press followed the exploits of these desperadoes avidly and heaped condemnation on those counties that failed to control them. By the early 1890s, Bibb County bore the heaviest burden of shame. It was known as “Bloody Bibb.” And yet, from time to time throughout the last quarter of the nineteenth century, Bibb’s neighboring counties were bloody, too. Besides producing criminals of their own, they were havens for others who operated without any respect for county lines. This article recounts the exploits of some of these criminals.
Stop Thief! Nineteenth-Century Wanted Posters
This photographic section features posters selected from the collections of the William Stanley Hoole Special Collections Library. Written in the days before photography was common, these posters were created by people who had to rely primarily on their descriptive capabilities in order to distinguish the person or animal or object they sought from others of its kind. Apparently they took to their task with relish, describing teeth, scars, skin color, physical deformities, and personality traits with remarkable candor if not total objectivity.
