Encyclopedia of Alabama

Charles Octavius Boothe, an influential Black Baptist preacher, educator, and author, was born June 13, 1845, in Mobile County. Boothe was raised in the Black Baptist faith by his grandfather and mother. Most of the details of Boothe's early life consist of his own reminiscences in his partly autobiographical Cyclopedia of the Colored Baptists of Alabama, published in 1895. The two volume publication documented the efforts of African American Baptists in Alabama. From the mid-1860s to the turn of the 20th century, Boothe's career followed two sometimes intertwined paths: He strove to improve the lives of formerly enslaved persons through educational and religious efforts and worked cooperatively with white Baptist organizations, in the North and South, to fund those efforts. In the early 1870s, Boothe joined the Colored Baptist Missionary Convention of the State of Alabama, which offered Black Baptists a forum to express their faith outside of white control. Along with Talladega minister William H. McAlpine, he urged the convention to support Selma University, which opened in 1878, and served as its president in 1901 and 1902. He also served as editor of a religious newspaper, the Baptist Pioneer, using subscriptions to underwrite some of the college's expenses. In 1877, he helped found the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, made famous during the civil rights movement by its pastor, Martin Luther King Jr. After many years of working against racial oppression, Boothe wearied of the Jim Crow South. He moved north some time in the 1910s, although little is known about his life after he left Alabama. He died in Detroit on February 27, 1924. Read the EOA article: https://encyclopediaofalabama.org/article/charles-octavius-boothe/

This undated photograph shows future Alabama governor William W. Brandon in uniform and on a horse as a member of the Alabama National Guard. His military career began in 1886, when he joined the Warrior Guards of the Alabama National Guard when he was 18 or 19 years old. With the outbreak of the Spanish-American War in April 1898, Brandon joined the Second Alabama Volunteers and was promoted to major. He was not among the U.S. forces that landed in Cuba on June 10, 1898. His unit was dispatched to Florida, where it remained until the brief war ended. In 1899, Brandon was appointed state adjutant general by Gov. Joseph F. Johnston. He was reappointed by governors William J. Samford and William D. Jelks, serving in that role until 1907. Brandon made his first run for governor in 1918, coming in a close second to Thomas Kilby. He continued to campaign vigorously during the next four years and was elected governor in 1922 by a margin of three to one over Bibb Graves, who was making his first bid for the office. As governor, Bandon created the Alabama State Docks Commission, which helped transform Mobile into a major gulf port. Following his single term as governor, Brandon returned to the office of probate judge of Tuscaloosa County (by appointment of Governor Bibb Grave). He died in Tuscaloosa on December 7, 1934. In 1938, the National Guard armory in Tuscaloosa was dedicated as Fort William W. Brandon. (Photograph courtesy of the Alabama Department of Archives and History) Read the EOA article: https://encyclopediaofalabama.org/article/william-w-brandon-1923-27/

This 1974 sculpture of a Mississippian chieftain adorns the entrance to the George Wallace Tunnel in Mobile. It was created by sculptor and author Julian Lee Rayford, who was born in the city on April 7, 1908. Known to his friends as "Judy," Rayford was a novelist and poet and wrote non-fiction works on folklore. He also he produced many sculptures, some of which can be seen in his native city. As a child, he showed an early interest in art, but it was soon discovered that he was color-blind. So he took up sculpture. In the late 1920s, he apprenticed under Gutzon Borglum, who carved Mount Rushmore in South Dakota. In 1933 and 1934, Rayford was employed with the Public Works of Art Project in Washington, D.C., making plaster models of American folk heroes, including Uncle Remus, Davy Crockett, Mark Twain, Casey Jones, and John Henry. Rayford was inducted into the U.S. Army in March 1941, and discharged in December when it was discovered he suffered from narcolepsy. During World War II, he painted camouflage on warships in Canada. After the war he lived in Mobile for the rest of his life. Rayford also had a wide reputation as a story-teller and is credited with reviving the story of Joe Cain's role in reestablishing Mobile's Mardi Gras celebration after the Civil War. In 1962, he published a history of the Mardi Gras, Chasin' the Devil Round a Stump. Rayford died of cancer on August 3, 1980. (Photograph courtesy of Claire Wilson) Read the EOA article: https://encyclopediaofalabama.org/article/julian-lee-rayford/

On June 4, 1800, Washington County was created as a county by Mississippi Territory Gov. Winthrop Sargent. It was named after the first president of the United States, George Washington and is the oldest established county in Alabama. Washington County was part of Alabama Territory, when it was created in March 1816, and was home to the territorial capital, St. Stephens, from 1817 and 1819. The county's original boundaries extended 300 miles east to west and 88 miles to the north and south. Some 26,400 square miles of Washington County's original territory were carved out to make 16 counties in Mississippi and 29 counties in Alabama. Image shows the Old Washington County Courthouse, in "New" St. Stephens, which is located approximately three miles of the territorial capital. The building, which was completed in 1854, was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1997. The current seat of government for Washington County is Chatom. (Photograph courtesy of Jimmy Emerson) Read the EOA article: https://encyclopediaofalabama.org/article/washington-county/

The popular funk and soul band the Commodores was formed in Tuskegee (Macon County) in 1968 when the bands The Mystics and The Jays merged, and the group became known as a hot party band in the central Alabama area. A few years later, in 1971, the Commodores were opening for The Jackson 5. The band included Lionel Richie, saxophonist, vocalist, and keyboardist; bass and trumpet player Ronald LaPread; guitarist Thomas McClary; vocalist and drummer Walter "Clyde" Orange; Milan Williams on keyboards, drums, and guitar; and William King, who is still with the band, on trumpet. Motown signed the group to a recording and performing contract in 1972. LaPread, who performed with the Commodores from 1970 to 1986, died on May 30, 2026, in New Zealand. His hits with the Commodores included "Brick House," "Three Times a Lady," and "Easy." Photograph shows a promotional studio shot of the Commodores in the 1970s. Read the EOA article: https://encyclopediaofalabama.org/article/the-commodores/

Gordon Persons, Alabama's 42nd governor, died on May 29, 1965, following a major stroke. Persons served as governor from 1951 to 1955. He was born on February 5, 1902, in Montgomery. In his youth, he roared through the streets of Montgomery on a motorcycle while most boys his age slowly pedaled about town on bicycles. Following a year of college, Persons tried his hand at multiple occupations, and eventually opened a radio-parts store in Montgomery. In 1930 he and a partner founded the radio station WSFA. In 1935, Gov. Bibb Graves appointed Persons chairman of the state Rural Electrification Authority (REA). Three years later, Persons formed his own engineering firm and installed more than 10,000 miles of electrical lines in Alabama. By 1940, Persons had earned a small fortune and was a hero to many farmers who benefited from his efforts to bring electricity to families in rural Alabama. He campaigned unsuccessfully for the presidency of the Public Service Commission (PSC) in 1940. He won when he ran for the position for the position again in 1944. By 1946 Persons was making a bid for governor, a race in which he finished last. He ran again in 1950, and traveled the state in a two-two seat helicopter. His whirlybird campaign made 385 landings, and one of his competitors labeled Persons the "Man from Mars." Persons won 35 percent of the primary vote, far ahead of the 14 other candidates. His opponent in the runoff election withdrew from the race. Persons, along with his family, was the first governor to live in the newly purchased governor's mansion on Perry Street. His first official act as governor was to call a meeting of the board of trustees at Auburn for the purpose of firing that institution's losing coach, Earl Brown. They then hired Selma native Ralph "Shug" Jordan, who restored Auburn's winning football program. Persons also encouraged the state to create an Educational Television Commission, making Alabama the first state to do so. The Gordon Persons Building in downtown Montgomery, which houses several government agencies, is named in his honor. (Portrait of Persons courtesy of the Alabama Department of Archives and History) Read the EOA article: https://encyclopediaofalabama.org/article/seth-gordon-persons-1951-55/

The Indian Removal Act was signed into law by President Andrew Jackson on May 28, 1830. It authorized the president to appoint commissioners to meet with each eastern Indian tribe to set conditions for giving up title to their existing land in exchange for lands in Indian Territory (now the states of Oklahoma and Kansas) west of the Mississippi River. The act covered tribes in Alabama:

In September 1830, representatives of the Choctaw Nation and the United States agreed upon the Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek. It was the first treaty signed after the creation of the Indian Removal Act. With the treaty, the Choctaw ceded control of their communally held lands in central Mississippi and west-central Alabama, more than 10 million acres, to the U.S. government. Twice, the chiefs rejected the terms because a group of seven women elders (who sat front-and-center at the negotiations) refused to permit the sale of any of their ancestral lands. Under the matrilineal society of the Choctaws, women traditionally controlled access to and governance of land and families. As a result, the American commissioners called off the negotiations and instead met secretly with Choctaw chiefs and others to produce a treaty.

In 1831, the state of Alabama asserted its sovereignty by extending its laws to unceded Muscogee (Creek) territories. Creek leaders sent a delegation, headed by Tuckabatchee leader Opothle Yoholo, to Washington to defend their treaty rights and issue complaints against such actions, which authorities in Washington had done nothing to address. While in Washington, the delegation sensed the futility of their attempts to avert removal and on March 24, 1832, Creek delegates agreed to the Treaty of Cusseta, which set forth the conditions of their removal.

Principal chief John Ross led the Cherokee Nation's struggle to stay, taking the battle for sovereignty to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1832. Though the court ruled for the Cherokees, the decision was not enforce and the forced removal of the Cherokees began in September 1838.

The Chickasaws agreed to cede their two million acres in Alabama and Mississippi in exchange for an equal amount of land to the west, but this treaty was voided when a suitable area could not be found. A new treaty was signed in 1832 in Chickasaw territory at Pontotoc Creek in present-day Pontotoc County, Mississippi, under which the Chickasaw ceded all their remaining lands, including an area in northwest Alabama south of the Tennessee River.

The Yuchis were active in resistance to Jackson's policy of Indian removal, but most Yuchis accompanied their Creek neighbors west to Indian Territory in 1836. Yuchi Town, located in what is now Russell County, Alabama, was one of a number of Indian towns near the Chattahoochee River occupied through the time of removal to Indian Territory. Some Yuchis also resided among the Upper Creek towns in north-central Alabama.

To escape forced removal, the Piqua Shawnee hid themselves in the area east of the Coosa River around Kymulga (old Shawnee town) and Kymulga Cave in Childersburg. (Today, Kymulga Cave is known as Majestic Caverns.) By 1832, the tribe had concealed themselves from census takers. They did not distinguish between the Piqua Shawnee and the Creeks when they were taking censuses of Creek towns and villages. The Piqua are one of five divisions of the Shawnee people; the geographic range of ancestral Piqua covers much of what are now the states of Alabama and Georgia.

The image is a map showing traditional territorial homelands of the largest groups of indigenous peoples of what is now Alabama, as they were in the 1820. The Chickasaws are in the northwest corner of the state, the Choctaws in the southwest corner, the Cherokees in the in the northern section, and the vast majority of land in the controlled by the Creeks. Photograph courtesy of the U.S. National Park Service.

Review a list of EOA articles on Indigenous Alabamians: https://encyclopediaofalabama.org/collection/american-indians-in-alabama/

In honor of World Turtle Day, which is May 23, let's celebrate the Alabama red-bellied turtle (Pseudemys alabamensis). It was named the state reptile by the Alabama Legislature in 1990. The Alabama red-bellied turtle is one of seven "cooter" species of freshwater turtle, with that name deriving from the word for turtle, kuta, brought to the Southeast by enslaved peoples from the West African nation of Mali. When it was designated the state reptile, the Alabama red-bellied turtle was thought to be endemic, meaning found nowhere else in the world. In recent years, however, a population was discovered in the Pascagoula River of southeastern Mississippi. The Alabama red-bellied turtle was placed on the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's Endangered Species List in 1987. Image shows an Alabama red-bellied turtle sunning itself on a fallen tree in the Mobile-Tensaw Delta. (Photograph, by James Godwin, courtesy of Auburn University Natural Heritage Program) Read the EOA article: https://encyclopediaofalabama.org/article/alabama-red-bellied-turtle/

On May 20, 1861, the capital of the Confederate government moved from Montgomery, Alabama, to Richmond, Virginia. After Alabama seceded from the Union on January 11, 1861, representatives from the other seceding states met in Montgomery to form a new government. The delegates to the constitutional convention named Jefferson Davis the provisional president on February 9, and he was inaugurated on the portico of the Capitol on February 18, 1861. The executive residence where Davis and his family lived for three months, from February to May of that year, is now a museum. In 1921, the house was relocated from a corner of Bibb and Lee Streets to Washington Avenue near the Alabama state capitol. After Fort Sumter was fired upon on April 12 and Virginia seceded on April 17, the Confederate government moved to Richmond, Virginia, on May 20 and remained there until the end of the Civil War. Photograph shows the study at the museum house. The room's decor includes furnishings and items owned and used by Davis. (Photograph by Justin Dubois) Read the EOA article here: https://encyclopediaofalabama.org/article/first-white-house-of-the-confederacy/

The Eastern Shore of Mobile Bay has attracted vacationers for at least 200 years. In 1847, F. H. Chamberlin built the Grand Hotel, a two-story building with 40 rooms and two accessory buildings that housed the dining room and the bar, in Fairhope (Baldwin County). The entire complex stretched along some 100 feet of shoreline, and guests originally traveled to the hotel by steamboat. It was extremely successful, and Chamberlin soon purchased a nearby building to provide additional guest rooms. Today the Grand Hotel Golf Resort and Spa, which has been recognized by the Historic Hotels of America since 2011, occupies the spot. The first hotel on the site was built in 1822. The current hotel has earned numerous top rankings and awards, including Top 125 Resorts in the World ratings by Condé Nast Traveler; Top 500 Hotels in the World and Top 50 Best Resorts in America and Canada by Travel and Leisure; and Golf magazine's Best Golf Resorts in America. It has also received the Best Historic Hotel of the Year Award from Historic Hotels of America. Image show a man in a period costume firing a cannon in recognition of Civil War casualties who died on the site when it served as a military hospital. Each evening at sunset, staff at hotel fire a cannon in recognition of Civil War casualties who died on the site when it served as a military hospital. (Photograph courtesy of the Alabama NewsCenter) Read the EOA article: https://encyclopediaofalabama.org/article/grand-hotel-golf-resort-and-spa/