front cover of In the Path of the Storms
In the Path of the Storms
Bayou La Batre, Coden, and the Alabama Coast
Frye Gaillard
University of Alabama Press, 2008
The Gulf Coast villages of Bayou La Batre and Coden are two of Alabama’s most distinctive, with roots going back to the French settlements of the 18th century. For generations, the proud inhabitants of these communities have extracted their modest livings from the sea, sustained by a lesson handed down over time— that providing for the needs of one’s family is the only true measure of success. But the world has changed drastically for them. A global economy of higher gas prices and cheap imported seafood has threatened the lifeblood of the area. And in recent years a rash of hurricanes, culminating with Hurricane Katrina, has battered the hopes and dreams of these Bayou towns.
 
But they have known hard times and massive changes before. In the 1970s, refugees from Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos flooded into the area and within a few years made up a third of the local population. Three Buddhist temples soon took their places among the Catholic, Baptist, and Pentecostal churches that predominated, and for a time the different ethnic groups coexisted in a kind of uneasy peace. But now they are learning to pull together in an uncertain struggle to rebuild their communities.
 
In the Path of the Storms is a powerful portrait in words and photographs of a unique and unforgettable place. It is a story of tradition, and forces of change, and the epic struggle of these Gulf Coast communities to survive and thrive.
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In the Shadow of Hitler
Alabama's Jews, the Second World War, and the Holocaust
Dan J. Puckett
University of Alabama Press, 2014
In the Shadow of Hitler chronicles the experiences of Alabama Jews as they worked to overcome their own divisions in order to aid European Jews before, during, and after the Second World War.

In this extensive study of how southern Jews in the United States responded to the Nazi persecution of European Jews, Dan J. Puckett recounts the divisions between Alabama Jews in the early 1930s. As awareness of the horrors of the Holocaust spread, Jews across Alabama from different backgrounds and from Reform, Conservative, and Orthodox traditions worked to bridge their internal divisions in order to mount efforts to save Jewish lives in Europe. Only by leveraging their collective strength were Alabama’s Jews able to sway the opinions of newspaper editors, Christian groups, and the general public as well as lobby local, state, and national political leaders.

Puckett’s comprehensive analysis is enlivened and illustrated by true stories that will fascinate all readers of southern history. One such story concerns the Altneuschule Torah of Prague and describes how the Nazis, during their brutal occupation of Czechoslovakia, confiscated 1,564 Torahs and sacred Judaic objects from communities throughout Bohemia and Moravia as exhibits in a planned museum to the extinct Jewish race. Recovered after the war by the Czech Memorial Scrolls Trust, the Altneuschule Torah was acquired in 1982 by the Orthodox congregation Ahavas Chesed of Mobile. Ahavas Chesed re-consecrated the scroll as an Alabama memorial to Czech Jews who perished in Nazi death camps.

In the Shadow of Hitler illustrates how Alabama’s Jews, in seeking to influence the national and international well-being of Jews, were changed, emerging from the war period with close cultural and religious cooperation that continues today.
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Indian Place Names in Alabama
William A. Read, and revised edition by James B. McMillan
University of Alabama Press, 1984

"What is the 'meaning' of names like Coosa and Tallapoosa? Who named the Alabama and Tombigbee and Tennessee rivers? How are Cheaha and Conecuh and Talladega pronounced? How did Opelika and Tuscaloosa get their names? Questions like these, which are asked by laymen as well as by historians, geographers, and students of the English language, can be answered only by study of the origins and history of the Indian names that dot the map of Alabama.—from the Foreword

Originally published by Professor Read in 1937, this volume was revised, updated, and annotated in 1984 by James B. McMillan and remains the single best compedium on the topic.

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Inside Alabama
A Personal History of My State
Harvey H. Jackson
University of Alabama Press, 2003
An affectionate, irreverent, candid look at the "Heart of Dixie"

This book tells Alabama’s history in a conversational style with an unapologetically subjective approach. Accessible to general readers and students alike, it recounts the history and politics of a state known for its colorful past, told by one of the state’s most noted historians and educators, whose family came to the territory before statehood. A native and resident Alabamian, Harvey Jackson has spent a lifetime discovering and trying to understand his state. Expressing deep love for its people and culture, he is no less critical of its shortcomings.

Inside Alabama, as the title implies, gives Jackson’s insider perspective on the events and conditions that shaped modern-day Alabama. With humor and candor, he explores the state’s cultural, political, and economic development from prehistoric times to the dawning of the new millennium. Mound-builders, Hernando de Soto, William Bartram, Red Sticks, Andy Jackson, Bourbon Democrats, suffragettes, New Dealers, Hugo Black, Martin Luther King Jr., George Wallace, Rosa Parks all play colorful parts in this popular history. By focusing on state politics as the most accessible and tangible expression of these shaping forces, Jackson organizes the fourteen chapters chronologically, artfully explaining why the past is so important today.
 
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front cover of An Insight into an Insane Asylum
An Insight into an Insane Asylum
Joseph Camp
University of Alabama Press, 2011

In 1881, Joseph Camp, an elderly and self-trained Methodist minister from Talladega County in eastern Alabama, was brought by his family to Bryce Hospital, an insane asylum in Tuscaloosa, where he remained for over five months. Camp, misled by relatives concerning the purpose of the trip, was shocked and angered at his loss of freedom and his treatment in the hospital. After his release, he composed an account of his stay and published it at his own expense, providing a rare glimpse of 19th century mental health care from a patient’s viewpoint. Camp’s account reveals his naive trust in others, but also a sharp and retentive memory. Camp is remarkably accurate in his account of the details of his treatment and the operation and staff of the hospital, although his emotional assessments reflect his unhappiness with his situation. Adding to the importance of Camp’s account is the fact that in the 19th century Bryce was considered a remarkably humane institution focused on recovery. Camp provides a glimpse into how treatment for the insane felt to the recipient.

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front cover of Iron and Steel
Iron and Steel
A Driving Guide to the Birmingham Area Industrial Heritage
James R. Bennett and Karen R. Utz
University of Alabama Press, 2010

This guidebook of historic iron-production sites is designed to give the reader a factual and illuminating look at the people and events that shaped Birmingham into one of America’s leading steel centers. Iron & Steel is heavily illustrated with both color and historical black-and-white photographs. It can be used while visiting parks or read as a coherent volume before or after a visit.

The book contains chapters devoted to the larger preserved sites open to the public, such as Sloss Furnaces National Historic Landmark and Tannehill Ironworks Historical State Park. It also highlights lesser-known, yet still accessible, sites such as Blocton Coke Ovens Park. The work provides easy-to-follow maps for every site as well as driving directions to the more remote locations, giving visitors easy access to all the notable iron and steel sites in Jefferson, Shelby, Tuscaloosa, and Bibb counties. Each chapter also includes a variety of historical information, with accompanying photographs, in order to present the reader with a detailed and comprehensive account of the Birmingham Iron and Steel District.

Featured sites include: Tannehill Ironworks Historical State Park; Shelby Ironworks Park; Billy Gould Coke Ovens Park; Brierfield Ironworks Historical State Park; Oxmoor Furnace Site; Irondale Furnace Park; Helena Rolling Mill Site; Red Mountain Park, Iron Ore Mines; Lewisburg Coke Ovens Park; Sloss Furnaces National Historic Landmark; Ruffner Mountain Nature Center; Blocton Coke Ovens Park; and Vulcan Park and Museum.

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It is Union and Liberty
Alabama Coal Miners, 1898-1998
Edwin L. Brown
University of Alabama Press, 1999

This history of Alabama's coal miners documents the struggle not
only between labor and management but also between interracial unionism
and white supremacy.

Much of Alabama's labor history is written in its coal
fields. This book records the critical contribution that District 20 of
the United Mine Workers of America played in the state's labor movement
through its strong stands on such issues as child labor, public education,
and inter-racial unions.

Standing at the cutting edge of social and political
history, these essays cover five periods over a century of union activity:
the emergence of a militant labor force during mining's formative years;
the World War I era, when mine operators tried to divide black and white
labor; the increasing role of the state in labor relations during the interwar
years; rapid changes in the union between 1942 and 1975; and the 1977-79
strike, the largest in the United Mine Workers' history.

Through historic
photographs and depictions of living and working conditions, contributors
Edwin L. Brown, Colin J. Davis, Daniel Letwin, Brian M. Kelly, Peter Alexander,
Glenn Feldman, and Robert H. Woodrum portray the world that miners, both
black and white, made. In a state where racial segregation was the norm,
even the earliest District 20 contract proposals demanded equal pay for
equal work regardless of color. It Is Union and Liberty shows that the
UMW in Alabama stands apart from perceptions of southern trade unionism
as exclusionary and racially fragmented. It sheds light on an important
segment of the state's labor history and is a testament to District 20
on its centennial celebration.

Edwin Brown is Associate
Professor in the Center for Labor Education and Research and Colin Davis is Associate Professor in the Department of History, both at
the University of Alabama at Birmingham.

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