In Tribute to
Pauline Bray Fletcher
1878 - 1970
The First Black Registered Nurse of Alabama
Through self-sacrifice, perseverance founded in 1926 Camp Pauline Bray Fletcher.
Renewing the faith and the good health of all black . . . — — Map (db m27393) HM
Rev. Shuttlesworth was not completely satisfied with the settlement Dr. King
worked out with Birmingham's White power structure to end “Project C”
while he lay injured at the hospital. Even so, Birmingham's African Americans
finally won their . . . — — Map (db m187593) HM
Rev. Shuttlesworth recruited Dr. King and the SCLC to build publicity for
the Birmingham Movement, King invited popular jazz singer Al Hibbler,
one of the first celebrities to take part in the “Project C" marches. King
hoped Hibbler's arrest . . . — — Map (db m187782) HM
Birmingham Blacks had no love for police, who often harassed and brutalized them rather than protect them from bombings and violence.
Some policemen were suspected Ku Klux Klan members or sympathizers.
Public Safety Commissioner Eugene “Bull” . . . — — Map (db m73032) HM
Built 1952, 1501 7th Ave. N.
Poole Funeral Chapel served as a “safe haven” for demonstrators during “Project C's” mass civil rights demonstrations in
April - May 1963. In 1957, its owners, brothers John and Ernest
Poole, came to the rescue . . . — — Map (db m187905) HM
Throughout May 1963, the pressure continued to build. The downtown business district was closed, a prominent black-owned motel was bombed, and 3,000 federal troops were dispatched to restore order before Birmingham was officially desegregated. This . . . — — Map (db m73021) HM
No one did more to bring about positive change in Birmingham than the Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth. In his struggle for equal rights, he survived a series of assaults, including the bombing of his home and a brutal armed beating by the Ku Klux Klan. . . . — — Map (db m73025) HM
White businessmen failed to integrate their stores and remove "Colored”
signs from water fountains and dressing rooms as promised in 1962. As
a result, Miles College students led by Frank Dukes organized a boycott
against the stores. They . . . — — Map (db m187758) HM
Built 1924 (remodeled for offices in 1995), 413 16th St. N.
Judge Helen Shores Lee bought this one-story building, a
garage from the U.S. Post Office, in 1995 and turned into a law
center to honor her father, pioneer civil rights lawyer . . . — — Map (db m188192) HM
Sixteenth Street Baptist Church has been designated a National Historic Landmark. This property possesses national significance in commemorating the history of the United States. In 1963 it was the staging ground for the Birmingham Campaign Civil . . . — — Map (db m63733) HM
Built 1911, 1530 6th Ave. N.
Sixteenth Street Baptist Church was designed by Wallace
Rayfield, a renowned Black architect. It was among
Birmingham's most prominent African-American churches.
By the time of the 1963 Birmingham Movement, it . . . — — Map (db m187523) HM
Built 1959, 1410 & 1414 6th Ave. N.
Sixth Avenue Zion Hill Baptist Church hosted strategy and mass meetings during the Birmingham Movement. It also served as the departure points for the April 12, 1963, Good Friday march to City Hall, led . . . — — Map (db m244958) HM
Built 1973, 708 15th St. N.
St. John AME Church and Day Care Center are on the site of
the former church that hosted Monday night mass meetings
during the early 1960s. It was also a center where “Project
C" leaders came to strategize about . . . — — Map (db m187892) HM
Built 1904; Renovations 1948-51, 1500 6th Ave. N.
St. Paul United Methodist Church was the site of the first
mass meeting held on Dec. 26, 1956, following the ACMHR's
(Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights) first
major direct action . . . — — Map (db m187868) HM
Built 1949, 1622 4th Ave. N.
This small, one-story, brick commercial taxi stand building was
constructed after the passage of a 1930 City of Birmingham
ordinance that required separate taxi services for Blacks
and Whites. Rev. George . . . — — Map (db m188185) HM
Built by the Publix Theater division of Paramount Studios. This movie palace opened on December 26th, 1927. The theatre, in Spanish / Moorish design by Graven and Mayger of Chicago, seated 2500 in a five story, three-tiered auditorium. Paramount's . . . — — Map (db m27337) HM
A key player in the Birmingham civil rights drama was Public Safety
Commissioner Theophilus Eugene Connor. He earned the nickname
"Bull” because of his booming voice as a radio sports announcer. White
voters who supported his politics of racial . . . — — Map (db m187780) HM
On May 2, 1963, more than 1,000 students skipped school and marched on downtown, gathering at the 16th Street Baptist Church. Bull Connor responded by jailing more than 600 children that day. So the next day, another 1,000 students filled the park . . . — — Map (db m73017) HM
After nearly a month, “Project C” seemed on the verge of collapse. The
presence of Dr. King and the SCLC did not rally Black Birmingham behind
the Movement as leaders hoped. The media began to lose interest and
the White community basically . . . — — Map (db m187840) HM
Rev. Bevel and his team worked with popular disc jockeys "Tall Paul”
Dudley White and Shelley “The Playboy" Stewart, whose jive talk on the
radio was actually a secret code that told young foot soldiers when it
was time to "move out.” Despite . . . — — Map (db m187770) HM
When notoriously racist police commissioner Eugene "Bull" Connor sicced dogs on the "Foot Soldiers" of the movement, civil rights leaders hoped it would shine a national spotlight on their plight, but the country at large remained woefully ignorant. . . . — — Map (db m73398) HM
Built 1925, 1616-1622 4th Ave. N.
Located in the Historic Fourth Avenue Business District next to
the taxi stand and Colored Masonic Temple, this building
housed one of Birmingham's few hotels for Black travelers. It
also housed restaurants . . . — — Map (db m188186) HM
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., hoped to gain more national attention for the
Birmingham campaign by planning marches during Holy Week - on Palm
Sunday, Good Friday and Easter Sunday. But "Bull” Connor created serious problems for King. Connor got a . . . — — Map (db m187834) HM
Built to house the Birmingham Branch of the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, the Historic Federal Reserve building was completed in 1927 out of poured concrete and white Stone Mountain, Georgia granite. The building was designed by architecture firm . . . — — Map (db m216138) HM
By the end of April 1963, the national media and local Whites were
losing interest in “Project C.” Fewer Blacks volunteered to be arrested at
downtown stores and lunch counters. So, Rev. James Bevel, a field
Secretary with the SCLC, turned to a . . . — — Map (db m187765) HM
Ministers in 60 Black churches across the city played key roles in the
Birmingham Movement. In the mass meetings, ministers fired up their
working-class members and encouraged commitment to the struggle
against segregation with revival-style . . . — — Map (db m187529) HM
Built in the 1940S, 4th Ave. N. & 19th St. N.
On Mother's Day in 1961, the Freedom Riders, Black and White
members of the Congress for Racial Equality (CORE), arrived at
Birmingham's Trailways bus station. Though integrated . . . — — Map (db m187994) HM
C28 Side
Built 1921, 1800 5th Ave. N.
Lawyers like Arthur Shores and Thurgood Marshall (shown
with Autherine Lucy, the first Black student to integrate the
University of Alabama) filed numerous lawsuits challenging
racial . . . — — Map (db m188003) HM
Bull Connor ordered the fearless "Child Crusaders" to be blasted with high-pressure fire hoses, and he once again loosed the dogs on the young demonstrators. When the media finally exposed the nation to the cruel scene, President John F. Kennedy . . . — — Map (db m73019) HM
For seven years before the 1963 Birmingham Campaign, Rev. Shuttlesworth
and other leaders of the ACMHR taught masses of Black citizens how
to take direct but non-violent actions to gain first-class American
citizenship. Inspired by faith, these . . . — — Map (db m187787) HM
Founded in 1898 by Robert Jemison, this 30-acre historic district is a private residential park containing an almost intact collection of some of Birmingham's finest 20th century houses. It was the first professionally landscaped residential . . . — — Map (db m27520) HM
April 1916
On April 10, 1916, the U.S. Supreme Court heard a
case from Louisville, Kentucky, where it was illegal
to sell homes to Blacks in areas where Whites lived.
The high court's 1917 decision in Buchanan v. Warley
said Louisville's . . . — — Map (db m189158) HM
This residential area was carved from the Joseph Riley Smith plantation, a 600 acre antebellum farm, one of the largest in 19th century Jefferson County. Smithfield lies to the west of Birmingham's city center on the flat land & hills north of . . . — — Map (db m26990) HM
The house was built c. 1908 for Adolph B. Loveman, a Hungarian immigrant who in 1887 founded the dry goods business that evolved into one of Birmingham’s signature retail establishments, Loveman, Joseph & Loeb. Its English-style neighbor to the . . . — — Map (db m83800) HM
This neoclassical structure was built in 1905 for James W. Donnelly, "the father of the Birmingham Library System."
Donnelly moved to Birmingham from his native Cincinnati, Ohio after retiring from Proctor and Gamble. A much respected . . . — — Map (db m26740) HM
The church was founded when the Rev. Henry M. Edmonds and many members of a Southern Presbyterian congregation withdrew from the local Presbytery. During the first seven years it met in Temple Emanu-El synagogue and held evening services in the . . . — — Map (db m27093) HM
Dr. Mortimer Harvie Jordan and his wife, Florence E. Mudd, constructed their home between 1906 and 1908. After service in the Confederate army, Jordan studied medicine in Cincinnati and New York (under Alabama's famous gynecologist, Dr. J. Marion . . . — — Map (db m26743) HM
The first Alabama - Auburn football game was played on this site, formerly known as the Base Ball Park, on February 22, 1893. The Agricultural and Mechanical College's "Orange and Blue" met the University of Alabama's "Tuskaloosa" squad before a . . . — — Map (db m23500) HM
Named for St. Vincent de Paul, founder of the Daughters of Charity in France in 1633, the hospital opened December 20, 1898 in the temporarily rented Henry F. DeBardelaben mansion at 206 15th Street South. Father Patrick A. O’Reilly founded the . . . — — Map (db m27523) HM
Built during the Roaring Twenties, the Altamont
Apartments broke ground in 1924 and were
completed in 1925. Designed by architect Jacob E.
Sallte as an apartment/hotel, they were built
to attract affluent businessmen who desired
luxury, . . . — — Map (db m216069) HM
John Valentine Coe, president of Birmingham Lumber and Coal Company, commissioned this two-story Craftsman-Tudor Revival style house in 1908. Coe, who had previously been a lumber merchant in Selma, moved his family and business to Birmingham at the . . . — — Map (db m83858) HM
Built in 1937 by Gen. Louis Verdier Clark from a design by architect William T. Warren as a community playhouse for cultural activities. It was recognized as one of the best of its kind in the nation. Mrs. Vassar Allen - first president, Bernard . . . — — Map (db m27513) HM
Stephen E. Thompson was a native of Oberlin, Ohio who came to Birmingham in 1889 and became an active investor in real estate and land development. When he was ready to build his house on Highland Avenue, he chose an Oberlin architect, Daniel . . . — — Map (db m216071) HM
Raleigh B. and Edna Mae Kent donated this land to help provide an education for the families of the Oak Grove, Green Springs, and Shades Mountain communities. The wood-frame schoolhouse was completed in 1928 and named in honor of the Kent family . . . — — Map (db m291744) HM
This Statue of Liberty, a bronze replica one fifth the size of the original, was commissioned by Frank Park Samford as the symbol for the company he founded -Liberty National Life Insurance Company. Created by sculptors Archer and Lee Lawrie, the . . . — — Map (db m273726) HM
On March 3, 1899, the United States Pipe and Foundry Company was incorporated consolidating 14 iron and steel foundries in 9 states. One of these foundries, the Howard-Harrison Iron Company of Bessemer, was founded in 1889. In 1911, the Dimmick Pipe . . . — — Map (db m27526) HM
On October 1, 1886, the North Birmingham Land Company was formed to develop a planned industrial and residential town on 900 acres of land, formerly part of the Alfred Nathaniel Hawkins plantation north of Village Creek. The plan included sites for . . . — — Map (db m26700) HM
(First Plaque): Navy pilots typically had their names painted on the side and just below the cockpit of one of the squadron aircraft. Most also had "Call Signs," some of which became the nickname of the pilot. On the display aircraft this . . . — — Map (db m83808) HM
East Lake was planned in 1886 by the East Lake Land Company to help sell home sites to the men who came in the 1870's to work in Birmingham's steel industry. First named Lake Como, after the lake in the Italian Alps, it soon came to be called East . . . — — Map (db m83828) HM
Memorial Park is the site of the Miracle Sunday Prayer Vigil that occurred on May 5, 1963. to protest the incarceration of Civil Rights demonstrators held in the city jail. Citizens attending a mass meeting at New Pilgrim Baptist Church staged a . . . — — Map (db m295304) HM
Former members of Broad Street Baptist of Elyton organized South Elyton Baptist Church in November 1914, and named it for its location south of the AGS railroad, distinguishing the community from Old Elyton Architect and neighbor Wallace Rayfield . . . — — Map (db m295301) HM
In 1909, the township of Elyton built a school for African American children in Titusville on this site. Pioneer Black architect Wallace Rayfield, who lived nearby. selected the site. designed the building. and recommended the building contractor . . . — — Map (db m295298) HM
Pearl Harbor
May 31, 1941
Dear Friend,
I hope all is well with you. I am doing well but due to the present state of emergency the Pacific Fleet is held in a place known as Hawaiian Territory.
Would you do me a . . . — — Map (db m27409) HM
Side A The Elyton Land Company, which had founded the city of Birmingham in 1871, established a subsidiary, the Birmingham Water Works Company in 1887. Dr. Henry M. Caldwell, President of the Elyton Land Company, contracted with Judge A. O. . . . — — Map (db m83806) HM
In 1822 William Pullen, Revolutionary War veteran, acquired this land from the Federal Government for farming. In 1889 his heirs sold the land to the City of Birmingham for use as the New Southside Cemetery which operated from 1889 to 1909 with . . . — — Map (db m27096) HM
Extending across the crest of Red Mountain, is the state’s second oldest garden-landscaped residential area. Developed from 1911 to 1935 by Robert Jemison, Jr., Hill Ferguson, and Henry Key Milner using landscape architects C. W. Leavitt of New York . . . — — Map (db m41129) HM
Built by local industrialist A. H. "Rick" Woodward, this park opened on August 18, 1910. It is the oldest surviving baseball park in America. Rickwood served as the home park for both the Birmingham Barons (until 1987) and the Birmingham Black . . . — — Map (db m22526) HM
Built by Birmingham industrialist A. H. “Rick” Woodward, Rickwood Field served as home to the Birmingham Barons and Birmingham Black Barons for most of the 20th century. Recognized as “America’s Oldest Baseball Park,” . . . — — Map (db m83837) HM
On Aug. 18, 1915, Alabama
Equal Suffrage Association
and Birmingham Barons
hosted suffrage day here in
support of women's suffrage — — Map (db m188885) HM
In 1850 George James Roebuck and his wife Ann Hawkins Roebuck built a log cabin at the mouth of Roebuck Spring. His Influence and leadership led to the area around it to be known as Roebuck. In 1900 Alabama Boys Industrial School was located . . . — — Map (db m26688) HM
First blast furnace in Jefferson County erected near this site (1863) by Red Mountain Coal and Iron Co. Destroyed (1865) by Federal troops: rebuilt (1873) and second furnace added. Successful experimental run made in Furnace No. 2 (1876) using . . . — — Map (db m27280) HM
Disabled American Veterans Formed December 25, 1920.
Birmingham Chapter No. 4 Chartered January 25, 1926.
This memorial dedicated to our military forces and to all who have given their blood and lives that the republic might . . . — — Map (db m24347) WM
1937
Starting in the 1920s, demand for all housing in
Birmingham increased year after year as the
population grew. Residential areas zoned for
"Negroes,” however, remained the same. By the
1940s, surging Black demand and a postwar . . . — — Map (db m189168) HM
1936
Slum clearance became another facial zoning
Weapon. City health officials described. "Negro
quarters” as the unsanitary source of diseases that
threatened community health: Civic leaders used this
reasoning to win millions in federal . . . — — Map (db m189164) HM
The Creek Indian Cession of 1814 opened this section of Alabama to settlement. At the time of statehood in 1819 many pioneer families had located here in what later became known as Jones Valley. By 1820 the area was called Ruhama Valley as a result . . . — — Map (db m26680) HM
Founded in 1841 at Marion in Perry County by Alabama Baptists, Howard College was named for British prison reformer John Howard.
The liberal arts college moved to this site in 1887 and relocated to its present campus in Homewood, Alabama in . . . — — Map (db m26693) HM
Roebuck Springs was the first large residential suburb in Birmingham where planning and development were tied to the automobile, and the first community in the city associated with a golf course development. The 1910 land plan was designed to . . . — — Map (db m26684) HM
Wilson Chapel was built in 1916 as a memorial to James and Frances Wilson by their daughters, Rosa Wilson Eubanks and Minerva Wilson Constantine. At the time of its construction the area was developing into a community of country homes known as . . . — — Map (db m26681) HM
Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s ‘Letter From Birmingham Jail’
The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s "Letter From Birmingham Jail" is the most important written document of the Civil Rights Era. His eloquent justification of the movement and . . . — — Map (db m173404) HM
Civil Rights Evangelism for Justice
Rev. Joseph W. Ellwanger, the dynamic pastor of St. Paul Lutheran Church from 1958 to 1967, was a member of the Central Committee of Strategists for the Birmingham Civil Rights Campaign of 1963. On March . . . — — Map (db m295302) HM
Originally Sloss Furnaces had 120 beehive coke ovens on site,
each twelve feet in diameter. (similar to photo)
They were called 'beehive' as they had domed ceilings,
were built close together to maximize the benefits
of their collective heat, . . . — — Map (db m173373) HM
"No. 4018 made its last run from Bessemer, Alabama to Birmingham, Alabama on February 29, 1952 and was given by the railway to the City of Birmingham on May 29, 1952." — — Map (db m134921) HM
Racial Terrorism and Convict Leasing. Thousands of black people were the victims of lynching and racial violence in the United States between 1877 and 1950 Lynching was
a form of racial terrorism that went beyond only hanging, . . . — — Map (db m173372) HM
Seaboard Yard is a unique, award winning, mixed use, live-work project developed in 2005-2008 by Liz & Cory Mason John Lauriello, Bryan Holt and Julie Gieger.
The historic 35 acre site was once the home of the Seaboard Railroad's Birmingham . . . — — Map (db m220598) HM
In addition to making iron the furnace produced a molten waste called slag. Workers drained off the slag periodically through the cinder notch, a hole at the base of the furnace. After processing, the slag was sold for use in road building and in . . . — — Map (db m83839) HM
Construction of the stock trestle/tunnel complex was part of the extensive modernization that Sloss carried out between 1927 and 1931. Much of the work focused on mechanizing the charging operations and equipment—the stock trestle/tunnel . . . — — Map (db m69077) HM
The Gas System
Gas produced in the furnace as a by-product of the ironmaking process was used in the plant as fuel. A large pipe called the downcomer carried gas from the top of the furnace to the gas cleaning equipment, which removed the . . . — — Map (db m43669) HM
The raw materials for making iron—iron ore, limestone and dolomite, and coke—came to Sloss by railroad and were stored in the stock bins below. An inclined, steam-driven "skip hoist" carried the stock to the top of the furnace and . . . — — Map (db m83861) HM
This cemetery is the final resting place of three of the four young girls killed in the September 15, 1963 church bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church. Addie Mae Collins, Cynthia Wesley and Carol Robertson are buried here. The fourth victim, . . . — — Map (db m61197) HM
Mt. Zion Baptist Church began burying here in the mid-1800s. On June 2, 1970, New Grace Hill Cemetery, Inc., a subsidiary of the Booker T. Washington Insurance Company in Birmingham, purchased this cemetery and officially named it Zion Memorial . . . — — Map (db m35602) HM
Lynching In America.
Thousands of black people were the victims of lynching and racial violence in the United States between 1877 and 1950. The lynching of African Americans during this era was a form of racial terrorism intended to intimidate . . . — — Map (db m101159) HM
(side A)
Brookside's Unique Heritage
Originally settled by the Samuel and Mary “Polly” Fields family in the 1820s, Brookside enjoyed a quiet life as an agricultural community until industrialists discovered rich coal . . . — — Map (db m43223) HM
The town of Cardiff, Alabama has a long, rich history. Situated
along the winding picturesque banks of Five Mile Creek, the area
of present-day Cardiff was originally settled in the 1830s by the
Crocker family. According to historian Martha . . . — — Map (db m153234) HM
In 1700s, Native Americans occupied the Springs property. Robert Reed's family arrived in the area from North Carolina in 1816. They obtained a land grant; soon others moved to the area. In 1871, Dave Franklin built a log cabin in the area which was . . . — — Map (db m37230) HM
Local Methodist connections for Clay Methodist Church were Cedar Mountain Church and Shiloh Methodist Church. Samuel, a Revolutionary War soldier, was a notable member of these early churches. Many of his descendants are buried here. James Self . . . — — Map (db m117209) HM
The oldest marked grave is that of Nancy Paerson, daughter of William S. Turner who was born September 23, 1813 and died September 19, 1830. Jesse Taylor deeded land for this church and graveyard on February 15, 1856.
Listed in the Alabama . . . — — Map (db m25134) HM
Samuel Massey and his brother - in - law, Duke William Glenn, first came to this Territory in February 1814 with Lt. Col Reuben Nash's Regt. South Carolina Volunteer Militia to help defeat the Creek Indians in the War of 1812. Samuel Massey returned . . . — — Map (db m25088) HM
On Cahaba Mountain to the NW, springs form a fragile stream that grows as it carves through the steep, rocky terrain of Birmingham suburbs, flowing south on the Gulf Coastal Plain to the Alabama River, at the site of Alabama's first capital, . . . — — Map (db m25110) HM
The clay soil of the area, first cultivated by Creek Indians, gave this agricultural community it name in 1878 when a post office was established. Clay’s historical roots date to the early 1800s through two small communities, Ayres and Self’s Beat, . . . — — Map (db m83863) HM
Established about 1850, Wear Cemetery is located off Old Springville Road to the northeast at Countryside Circle. In the 1800's the Wear family was among the first settlers of the community later known as Clay. Twenty-three remaining graves were . . . — — Map (db m25113) HM
Miles College Leaders. Students Active During Civil Rights Era
The Colored Methodist Episcopal Church founded Miles College in
Fairfield in 1898. During the 1960s, President Lucius Pitts
encouraged students, faculty and staff to become . . . — — Map (db m153232) HM
Carved in marble, over the front door of this post office, is a frieze depicting a train, an airplane, and a ship. These represent three primary methods of transporting the mail in 1936, the year the Fairfield post office was built. At that time, . . . — — Map (db m289886) HM
Black Creek Park, part of the Five Mile Creek Greenway Partnership, encompasses the Fultondale Coke Oven Park development. The Fultondale Coke Oven Park preserves the environment and history of the old mining communities of north Birmingham, . . . — — Map (db m50823) HM
Side A When Andrew Jackson defeated the Creek Nation at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend in 1814, the subsequent Treaty of Fort Jackson and other treaties that followed ceded Indian land that made up most
of what is now Alabama. Abraham Stout . . . — — Map (db m39111) HM
Virgil Allen Howard, who was born in South Carolina in 1859, came to Alabama in 1884 seeking employment with the Alabama Waterworks. He and Ollie Grace Hogan were married on July 15, 1903 and made their first home in Gardendale on property they . . . — — Map (db m39221) HM
(side A)
In the latter 1800s and early 1900s, the city of Graysville was called Gin Town. Because Graysville had the only cotton gin for miles around, the town and community grew. As the community grew, the need for businesses and houses of . . . — — Map (db m43221) HM
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