Aldrich, Alabama | |
|---|---|
  Aldrich, Alabama  Aldrich, Alabama | |
| Coordinates: 33°06′27″N86°53′28″W / 33.10750°N 86.89111°W | |
| Country | United States |
| State | Alabama |
| County | Shelby |
| Elevation | 456 ft (139 m) |
| Time zone | UTC-6 (Central (CST)) |
| • Summer (DST) | UTC-5 (CDT) |
| Area codes | 205, 659 |
| GNIS feature ID | 112976 [1] |
Aldrich is an unincorporated community in Shelby County, Alabama, United States, that is now part of Montevallo. [1] [2]
Coal was mined in the area around Aldrich beginning in 1839. [3] In 1875, Truman H. Aldrich purchased the town surrounding the mines and named it Aldrich. He leased the mining operations to his younger brother, William F. Aldrich, who was married to Josephine Cables Aldrich, spiritualist, Theosophist, editor, and publisher. Convict labor was employed at some time during the operation of Aldrich's coal mines, and is mentioned in Douglas Blackmon's Slavery By Another Name . [4] A prison was built to house the convicts, and the convict cemetery is located near where the prison once stood. [3] The community was once home to churches, a school, and houses that were all built by the operators of the mines. [5] A post office was established in 1883, with William Aldrich as the first postmaster, and was in use until it was closed in 1965. [6] From 1895 to 1902, Aldrich had a locally published newspaper, The Alabama time-piece. [7] The mines were closed on July 5, 1942. [3] Today, Aldrich is home to the Aldrich Coal Mine Museum. [8]
Aldrich never reported a population figure separately on the U.S. Census as an unincorporated community on the U.S. Census according to the census returns from 1850 [9] -2010. [10] It has since been annexed into Montevallo.
Mulga is a town in western Jefferson County, Alabama, United States. It is north from the Birmingham suburb of Pleasant Grove. It includes the community of Bayview. Mulga was a company town operated by Birmingham Coal and Iron Company around the Mulga Mine and Mulga was also the name of an independent community in the area. The company town was incorporated in 1947.
Montevallo is a city in Shelby County, Alabama, United States. A college town, it is the home of the University of Montevallo, a public liberal arts university with approximately 3,000 students. As of the 2020 census, the population of the city of Montevallo is 7,229.
Joseph Emerson Brown, often referred to as Joe Brown, was an American attorney and politician, serving as the 42nd Governor of Georgia from 1857 to 1865, the only governor to serve four terms. He also served as a United States Senator from that state from 1880 to 1891.
Braxton Bragg Comer was an American politician who served as the 33rd governor of Alabama from 1907 to 1911, and a United States senator in 1920. As governor, he achieved railroad reform, lowering business rates in Alabama to make them more competitive with other states. He increased funding for the public school system, resulting in more rural schools and high schools in each county for white students and a rise in the state's literacy rate.
Convict leasing was a system of forced penal labor that was practiced historically in the Southern United States, the laborers being mainly African-American men; it was ended during the 20th century. It provided prisoner labor to private parties, such as plantation owners and corporations.
Truman Heminway Aldrich was a civil engineer, a mining company executive, and a paleontologist, and briefly served in the United States House of Representatives and as Postmaster of Birmingham. He is the sole Republican ever to represent Alabama's 9th congressional district, which existed from 1893 to 1963. His brother William F. Aldrich also represented Alabama in Congress, serving three partial terms during 1896–1901 from Alabama's 4th congressional district.
Bayview is a community in Jefferson County, Alabama, United States. It is north from the Birmingham suburb of Pleasant Grove. This community is built around Bayview Lake. It voted to be annexed by its nearest town of Mulga. However, Bayview today retains its own community identity.
Adger is an unincorporated crossroads community in Jefferson County, Alabama, southwest of Birmingham.
The Tennessee Coal, Iron and Railroad Company (1852–1952), also known as TCI and the Tennessee Company, was a major American steel manufacturer with interests in coal and iron ore mining and railroad operations. Originally based entirely within Tennessee, it relocated most of its business to Alabama in the late nineteenth century, following protests over its use of free convict labor. With a sizable real estate portfolio, the company owned several Birmingham satellite towns, including Ensley, Fairfield, Docena, Edgewater and Bayview. It also established a coal mining camp it sold to U.S. Steel which developed it into the Westfield, Alabama planned community.
Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II is a book by American writer Douglas A. Blackmon, published by Anchor Books in 2008. It explores the forced labor of prisoners, overwhelmingly African American men, through the convict lease system used by states, local governments, white farmers, and corporations after the American Civil War until World War II in the southern United States. Blackmon argues that slavery in the United States did not end with the Civil War, but instead persisted well into the 20th century. It depicts the subjugation of convict leasing, sharecropping and peonage and tells the fate of the former but not of the latter two.
Townley is an unincorporated community in Walker County, Alabama, United States. It was formerly an incorporated town from 1895 until the 1920s. Townley has one site on the National Register of Historic Places, Boshell's Mill.
Docena is an unincorporated community in Jefferson County, Alabama, United States. Docena is 8 miles (13 km) west-northwest of downtown Birmingham and has a post office with ZIP code 35060.
Calcis is an unincorporated community in Shelby County, Alabama, United States, located along Alabama State Route 25, 3 miles (4.8 km) north-northwest of Vincent.
The Aldrich Coal Mine Museum is a historical museum located in the former company store of Montevallo, Alabama. Aldrich was once a coal mining town, but is now a part of Montevallo. The museum contains historical photographs, artifacts, and displays from Aldrich's coal mine, churches, school, prison, stores, and post office. The only coal miner monument in Alabama is on display outside of the museum The museum is housed in the former Montevallo Mine Company commissary, containing the original sales counter and cash register, and documented by the Historic American Engineering Record as part of the Birmingham District. The Montevallo Coal Mine Company Store is listed on the Alabama Register of Landmarks and Heritage.
Coalburg is an unincorporated community in Jefferson County, Alabama, United States.
Acmar is a former unincorporated community and neighborhood within the city of Moody in St. Clair County, in the U.S. state of Alabama.
Acton is an unincorporated community in Shelby County, in the U.S. state of Alabama. It is partially located within the city of Hoover. It is not to be confused with the village of Acton, approximately 6+1⁄2 miles to the northeast in Jefferson County.
John Wallace Comer was a businessman, slave owner, mine operator and planter in Alabama during the Reconstruction Era and the early 1900s. The brother of Alabama Governor B. B. Comer, John Wallace Comer operated the Comer family plantation in Barbour County, Alabama. J. W. Comer served from 1863 until 1865 in the 57th Alabama Infantry Regiment during the American Civil War. J. W. Comer also operated the Eureka Iron Works throughout the late 1800s and early 1900s.
Abbot Springs is a settlement in Shelby County, Alabama, United States. While the community was once unincorporated, it is now part of eastern Westover. It lies less than 3 miles away from the town of Harpersville. It runs along a branch of Old Highway 280.
Acton is an unincorporated community in Jefferson County, in the U.S. state of Alabama. It is a suburban area bordering the city of Birmingham, centered around the intersection of Caldwell Mill Road and Old Looney Mill Road just west of the Cahaba River. It is not to be confused with the former mining village of Acton, Alabama in Shelby County (now within the city of Hoover, approximately 6+1⁄2 miles to the southwest as the crow flies. Initially, this Acton was also in Shelby County before a border adjustment shifted it into Jefferson County.
Municipalities and communities of Shelby County, Alabama, United States | ||
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| Other unincorporated communities | ||
| Footnotes | ‡This populated place also has portions in an adjacent county or counties | |