USA > Alabama > Hand-book of Alabama. A complete index to the state, with map > Part 31
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CITIES AND TOWNS.
Tuskaloosa, the Bessemer & Birmingham, the Birmingham, Powderly & Bessemer, the Birmingham, Brierfield & Bloeton. Beside these, the Birmingham, Sheffield & Tennessee River Railroad is being extended from Jasper, in Walker county, to Bessemer, which will give the city connection with the Ten- nessee river, now becoming so prominent as a transportation route for the product of Alabama furnaces. The character of construction in Bessemer is a monument to the faith of its founders and citizens. The Charleston business block, having a frontage of 300 feet, three and four stories in height, is a magnificent structure of pressed brick and marble and metal cornice work, cost $150.000.00, and would be an ornament to a city of 100,000 population ; the Grand hotel, three stories, of pressed brick, terra cotta and cut stone, 100 feet frontage on two streets, is an elegantly finished building. and cost over 875,000.00 ; the Montezuma hotel cost $75,000.00, and is one of the most attractive specimens of architecture in the south; it has a frontage of 194 feet and a depth of 200 ; it is in a park of ten acres. In addition to the above, may be mentioned Rebie hall, the First National Bank block, the Bessemer Savings Bank, the office building of the Bessemer Land and Improve- ment Company, and the armory. The new city hall is a large, imposing structure. of composite architecture, containing the city offices and court room, fire department and jail, and market house attached: it cost some $20,000.00. Bessemer has excellent free publie schools; churches representing all the leading religious denominations: good society, and an industrious and law abiding population. With an altitude of 600 feet above the sea level, and with the perfect natural drainage afforded by two mountain streams flowing through its limits, Bessemer is very free from fevers and malaria, and it may be safely asserted that, in point of health, it can com- pare favorably with any city in the State. When the city was laid off, park reservations were made at suitable intervals : many of these have been improved and add to the comfort and health of the people. The streets are kept clean and in good condition, and a system of sewerage, already established, is being constantly extended. The city has, practically, no floating debt, and its bonded indebtedness is only $30,000.00. Its tax rate is limited by the State Constitution to 50 cents on
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the 8100.00. Bessemer possesses exceptional advantages for nearly all kinds of manufacturing in iron and wood. Nowhere on this continent are the materials that enter mainly into such manufactures more abundant or cheaper. The city's proximity to the cotton belt of the State makes it, also, a most favorable point for cotton manufacturing. On the lands of the Bessemer Land and Improvement Company, in and near the city limits, are thousands of feet of railroad frontage, affording excellent manufacturing sites, which the company holds for the purpose of donating to those who may wish to locate their plants upon them. The amount that in many other places would have to be expended for a suitable site, in Bessemer can be saved and used in construction. The present valuation of unimproved city property is from $10.00 to $150.00 per front foot. Good business lots ean be purchased at from $40.00 to $100.00, and residence lots at from $10.00 to $50.00 per front foot. Resi- dence lots in suburban places and additions to the city plat can be purchased as low as $3.00 per front foot. Larger plats of land, for residence purposes, within a mile and a half to two miles of the centre of the city, can be purchased in acre tracts for $150.00. Business lots, except key lots, have a frontage of 25 feet and a depth, except in the corners, of 140 feet; on corners and key lots, 100 feet, and fronts of latter, 20 feet. The Bessemer Land and Improvement Company's residence lots are 50 feet front and 140 to 190 feet deep. Lots in addi- tions to the city and suburban plats vary in size. Over 2,000 lots have been sold in Bessemer, of which over 1,500 have been sold by the Bessemer Land and Improvement Company. Over one-half of the lots within the fire limits or business portion (an area of twenty blocks and (22 lots) have been sold. Purchases have been made principally by investors settling, or intending to settle, permanently in Bessemer, and not by speculators, simply purchasing for an advance. Eligible resi- dence lots can be obtained at this time within a half a dozen blocks of the business portion of the city at $10.00 per front foot, and business lots, within the fire limits, at $50.00 per front foot. Improved property, both residence and business, can be obtained at proportionate values-adding the cost of improvement to the prices of lots as given. Neat two room cottages, plastered, rent at $6.00 monthly ; with rough kitchen
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attached, at $7.00; three, four and five room houses, from $9.00 to $15,00: nice, commodious, five. six, seven and eight room houses from $15.00 to 835.00. Business houses and store rooms bring a rent of from $20.00 to $75.00 per month. With so large an amount invested in its mines and manu- factories ; with an annual pay roll of $1,000,000.00; with all the features of the modern city; with its increasing com- mercial importance: its metropolitan business blocks and handsome residences: its banks, schools and churches; its genial climate, admitted healthfulness, abundant transporta- tion facilities, and the wonderful resources of its surrounding country. surely nothing is lacking to give assurance that Bes- semer's past achievements are but suggestions of its future.
TUSKALOOSA.
Tuskaloosa, the county seat of Tuskaloosa county, is situ- ated on a high bluff on the east side of the Warrior river, 390 miles, by water, north of Mobile. The elevation of the city gives it a good natural drainage, which is supplemented by a system of sanitary sewers. The water supply is taken from the Warrior river, several miles above the city, and pumped into a stand pipe 135 feet high. The supply is abundant, and the elevation of the stand pipe gives a pressure sufficient for use by the fire department without the interven- tion of the engines. A street railroad line and a dummy line afford means of transportation between different parts of the city for both passengers and freight. The eity is lighted by electricity, and the Bell Telephone Company has an exchange located there. As a desirable place of residence, Tuskaloosa has few equals. Her streets and avenues are broad, and are shaded by triple rows of oaks; her climate is healthful and delightful; her churches are numerous ; her schools are of the best, and her people are hospitable and are unsurpassed in point of refinement and social culture. The city was for many years the capital of the State. The old capitol is now
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the seat of the Central Female College. The Tuskaloosa Female College, Verner's University High School, and the University of Alabama are also located there. The city has recently completed a $10,000 public school building, and sus- tains a complete system of primary, grammar and high schools. The Alabama Insane Hospital is located just beyond the city limits. By the census of 1890, the population of Tuskaloosa is 4,215, against 2,418 in 1880; a gain of 1,797 inhabitants, or 74.32 per cent. Its stores and public buildings would do credit to a much larger city. Among its various enterprises, commercial and industrial, may be mentioned two daily papers ; three banks, with resources of over $300,000,00 ; two large hotels ; the Tuskaloosa cotton mill, employing 145 persons ; the Tuskaloosa yarn and cordage mill, thirty-five persons ; the Tuskaloosa cotton-seed oil mill and ginnery, fifty persons; three brick yards, seventy-five persons ; two foundries, twenty persons; two ice factories, twenty persons ; two sash and blind factories, forty persons; the Tuskaloosa Manufacturing Company, 7,500 spindles, 240 looms, 275 hands, makes 750,000 pounds of yarn and 3,600,000 yards of plaids, checks and stripes per year ; three cotton warehouses; a cotton compress, handling 12,000 bales per annum, and a number of smaller workshops and factories. The commercial business of the city is large and covers every branch of trade and commerce. Good roads branch in all directions from Tuskaloosa. An iron bridge, built by the county at a cost of 840,000.00, connects the city with the town of Northport (1,500 population) on the western bank of the Warrior, and opens up the country beyond Northport to the Tuskaloosa merchants. And all of this has been done with but one line of railroad and a single steamboat line as means of trans- portation. The Alabama Great Southern Railroad connects Tuskaloosa with New Orleans, on the south, and Birmingham, Chattanooga, Louisville. and Cincinnati, on the north. This road is soon to have competition. The Birmingham Mineral division of the Louisville & Nashville now reaches to within seventeen miles of the city and is building towards her. Where the Louisville & Nashville goes, the East Tennessee, Virginia & Georgia will be likely to go. A line twenty miles long will give that system an entrance there. The projected
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line of the Florence & Mobile Railroad passes through one of her streets. At present a weekly boat plies between Mobile and Tuskaloosa. The completion of the government work now in progress will give a low water depth of six feet throughout the year between these points, and will open the way from the Warrior coal field to the gulf. At the present time this river has a depth of six feet 226 days and a depth of ten feet 112 days, on an average, each year. A line of road ten miles long, from the present limit of navigation, would pierce coal fields sufficient to supply the navies of the gulf and to meet all local and export demands for the next forty years. By the building of such a line and of proper boats and barges, coal could be landed in Mobile at $1.60 per ton, with a profit to the miner and to the steamboatman.
GADSDEN
Is situated at the southern terminus of Lookout mountain, on north bank of Coosa river, fifty-two miles from Rome, Georgia ; ninety miles from Chattanooga, Tennessee ; fifty-four miles northeast of Birmingham, and twenty-eight miles from Anniston; in the richest mineral and agricultural section in the State. Gadsden is the county seat of Etowah county ; was located in the year 1844 by James Lafferty, who built the first steamboat and opened up the Coosa river to navigation, in the year 1846. Gadsden was laid out by Mr. Lafferty, and was the principal trading point for the immense amount of merchandise that was used by all the counties lying west of Gadsden until the building of the railroads diverted the trans- portation of merchandise from the boats on Coosa river to railroads. Coosa river is navigable from Greensport to Rome, Georgia. Gadsden, by water, is 158 miles from Rome and thirty miles from Greensport. Previous to the war, all rail- roads chartered, running through the northern portion of Alabama and Georgia, had common termini at Gadsden. The Alabama & Tennessee River Railroad, commencing at Selma
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and ending at Gadsden : the Tennessee & Coosa Railroad, com- mencing at Gadsden and ending at Guntersville, connecting the waters of the Tennessee river with those of the Alabama river ; the Wills Valley Railroad, commencing at Chattanooga and ending at Gadsden ; the Northeast && Southwest Railroad, commencing at Gadsden and ending at Meridian, Mississippi : the Rome & Decatur, commencing at Rome and ending at Decatur, rio Gadsden, were all partially built before the war, but not until 1870 were either of these lines completed. All these roads, under various consolidations and new names, have at last reached Gadsden, and the city now has the East T'en- nessee, Virginia & Georgia Railroad, the Queen & Crescent Railroad, the Louisville & Nashville Railroad, the Nashville, Chattanooga & St. Louis Railroad, and the Chattanooga South- ern Railroad (from Chattanooga to Gadsden, to be extended to Birmingham), giving Gadsden equal railroad facilities with any point in the south. Gadsden has two blast furnaces, one coke and one charcoal; it has the Elliott car works, working 300 men and building a car complete-making their own wheels, doing all their own blacksmith work, casting and wood work. Gadsden has a paint mill, turning out six to eight tons per day ; it has two ice factories and one cold storage plant ; it has a large canning factory in successful operation; it has pipe works, for sanitary pipes, capacity eight to ten tons per day ; it has a foundry and machine shop, turning out first class engines and boilers; it also has variety works; door, sash and blind factory; large steam mill and planing mill. giving cheap material for the construction of houses. The ore for the furnaces at Gadsden is mined in the corporate limits, and coal is furnished to all industries, delivered, at from ninety cents to $1.15 per ton, and is of a very superior quality and is mined in sight of the city. In additon to the railroads mentioned, Gadsden has a standard guage dummy line, known as the Gadsden- Attalla Union Railroad, traversing the streets of Attalla, Alabama City and Gadsden, which is also a belt line, connecting all the railroads coming into the city. This dummy line has a branch line running to the top of Lookout mountain, reaching the famous Nocalula falls, one of the grandest pieces of scenery on the continent. The moun- tain and hills around Gadsden are filled with the richest
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iron ores-brown hematite on the east side of the river, and rich fossiliferous ores on the north and west of the city. The supply of ore is simply inexhaustible. Vast forests skirt the various railroads entering the city, as well as the banks of the Coosa river, making Gadsden the cheapest point in which to manufacture charcoal iron in the south. Gadsden has a fine public school system, with 800 enrolled pupils, and churches of all denominations. City tax rate is only one-half of 1 per cent. The health of the location is unsurpassed ; no malarious diseases are ever known here; altitude, about 700 feet above the sea, and, within two miles of the city, the top of Lookout mountain can be reached, giving a most delightful summer climate. The city's hotels are first class, with ample accommodations for the travelling public. The completion of the Tennessee & Coosa Railroad to Guntersville, to be opened to the public the 1st day of July, 1892, places in easy access immense quantities of mountain oak bark, making Gadsden a fine location for a large tannery. The neighboring forests abound with yellow pine and all the hard woods, making Gadsden a fine location for the manufacture of wagons, fur- niture and all articles made from wood. Cheap iron and cheap coal give the city equal advantages with Birmingham and Chattanooga for the manufacture of iron. The Coosa river is navigable the entire year, and furnishes a large amount of trade to Gadsden's merchants, as well as supplies a large amount of timber and lumber for the various industries of the city. Population by the census of 1890, 2,901.
SHEFFIELD.
Sheffield, like its neighboring city of Florence, is situated in the extreme northwestern portion of the State. It is in Colbert county, on the south side of the Tennessee river. The city is located on a bold bluff of the river, which reaches, in places, to an elevation of 150 feet above the water's level. The beginning of Sheffield dates from the year 1883. In that
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year, a syndicate for building the city was formed ; a stock company established, with a capital of $500,000.00; the site was purchased, and railroads chartered and commenced. The property included in the purchase comprised about 2,700 acres. A few months later there was a sale of lots at Shef- field, and 362 lots were sold at auction, realizing $350,000.00 in the aggregate. The charter of Sheffield is embraced in the
act of the general assembly, approved February 17, 1885, as amended by the act of February 28, 1889. The city is divided into four wards, and its government consists of a mayor and eight aldermen (two aldermen from each ward), styled the city council of Sheffield. The population, by the census of 1890, is 2,731. The site of Sheffield is one of the most eligi- ble for a city that could have been chosen. The surface, while sufficiently even for the laying out of streets, is yet broken in a way that offers excellent facilities for drainage, and, by its agreeable diversity, furnishes admirable sites for residences. The elevation of the bluff is a guarantee against all danger of overflow, and secures abundance of the freshest and purest air, with a fine outlook in all directions. South of Sheffield, extending for several miles, is an open country, clothed with woods, terminating in a grand mountain range, from which almost perpetual breezes temper the heat of mid-summer. In front is the broad and deep Tennessee, its banks free from swamps, and picturesque and healthful. The shore fronting the town is a natural landing, extending a mile in length and 200 feet deep, roads and railways being already made to the wharf front. Further south are points well adapted to the construction of wharves, and very convenient for the furnaces. The city has about ten miles of graded streets, the greater part of which is paved with chert gravel and is lighted with electricity. The water supply is obtained from the Tennessee river, and the mains of the water company reach every portion of the city. The city sustains an excellent public school, and all the leading religious denominations are represented by churches and congregations. Good order is kept, and the community is intelligent, progressive and law abiding. The more prominent buildings in Sheffield, finished or in course of construction, attract attention and attest the faith and enter- prise of its citizens. Among these are the First National
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Bank building, the Montgomery block, the Sheffield hotel, the Sheffield Land, Iron and Coal Company's building, the Mobile block, the Ware building, and the Cleveland hotel. Sheffield has many pretty and attractive private residences and all its houses and cottages are of good model and tasteful appearance. Like Florence,* two miles distant, Sheffield has the benefit of the Tennessee river to control and regulate transportation rates, and there are three lines of railway at present operating into the city, namely, the Memphis & Charleston Railroad, the Birming- ham, Sheffield & Tennessee River Railroad, and the Nashville, Florence & Sheffield Railroad. And, like Florence, Sheffield is located in the famous valley of the Tennessee, and the lands surrounding the city are of the same character and of equal fertility with those surrounding Florence. Sheffield is one of the most favorably located places in the United States for the manufacture of iron and steel. The brown hematite ores tributary to the city, along the lines of the Birmingham, Sheffield & Tennessee River Railroad, about twenty miles south, and the Nashville, Florence & Sheffield Railroad, about twenty miles north, show fifty-five to fifty-six per cent. of metallic iron, are lower in silica, require much less limestone for fluxing, and much less fuel for smelting, than do the red ores, and are in inexhaustible quantities. Limestone is in unlimited quantities at the furnace sites, and water is to be had at the cost of pumping. The great Warrior coal field, near by, will afford a bountiful and cheap supply of coke and coal for furnace, gas, steam and domestic purposes. Among the principal industries of Sheffield at present, are the Lady Ensley Coal, Iron & Railroad Company, the Alabama Iron & Railway Company, the Sheffield Stove Works, the Sheffield Land, Iron aud Coal Company, the Sheffield Compress Com- pany, the Sheffield Machine Company, the Sheffield Harness and Saddlery Company, the Standard Machine Works, the Sheffield Electric Light and Power Company, the Henderson Milling Company, the Sheffield Water Company, railroad shops of the Birmingham, Sheffield & Tennessee Railroad Company, Enterprise Wood Working Company, and Knowles planing mill. The capital which has been expended in Shef- field, since the city's foundation in 1883, in its furnaces,
. For a description of the city of Florence, see page 357, ante.
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mannfactories, hotels, public buildings, business houses and private residences, and in laying out the city, grading its streets, and other works of public improvement, is estimated at $5,000,000.00. The total debt of the city is $79,000.00, and the tax rate is 5 mills.
FORT PAYNE.
Fort Payne, the county seat of DeKalb county, is located in the northeastern portion of the' State, on the line of the Alabama Great Southern Railroad, which passes through the heart of the city. It is distant, by rail, fifty-one miles southwest from Chattanooga, Tennessee, and ninety-one miles northeast of Birmingham, Alabama, and is situated near the head of a valley, called the Little Wills valley, the beauty and general attractiveness of which have long been known and appreciated. The rise of the city dates from the fall of 1888, when the Fort Payne Coal and Iron Company was organized, " to build a manufacturing city in the Wills valley, at Fort l'ayne.". Priet to that time the site of the city was a little railroad village of scarce 300 inhabitants. The company purchased 32,000 acres of land in the vicinity of Fort Payne, and, in February, 1889, began the work of building the city. The city was incorporated by act of February 28, 1889, amended by aet of February 3, 1891. The first municipal election was held July 1, 1889. The city government consists of a mayor and city council. the latter body being composed of five councilmen. The.population of the city, by the census of 1890, is 2,698. Streets and avenues have been opened, graded and paved ; parks laid off and improved, and a system of sewerage established. Quite an elaborate system of water works supplies the city with pure and sparkling water, drawn from springs which are fed by streams from the heart of the mountain, and an electric light plant furnishes both are and incandescent lights. The DeKalb hotel, erected by the Fort Payne Coal and Iron Company, in 1889, upon an entire square
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in the centre of the city, at a large cost, is modern and complete in all its appointments, and ranks among the best hotels in the south. The new passenger depot of the Alabama Great Southern Railroad, built at a cost of $25,000.00, is a very handsome structure. The mountain ranges about Fort Payne-Lookout mountain, on the east, and Sand mountain, on the west-abound in romantic scenery, rocky glens and tumbling waters. The city enjoys excellent health, and its elevation above tide water-800 to 1,200 feet-insures it a good summer climate, with cool and restful nights, and its winters are comparatively mild. The city has good public and private schools and churches of all the leading denomina- tions. The debt of the city is $45,000.00, and its tax rate is fifty cents on' the 8100.00. The taxable property in the city in 1888 amounted in valne to $146,633.00; in 1891, to $2,474,- 172.54. There are two railroads at present operating into Fort Payne-the Alabama Great Southern Railroad and the Port Payne & Eastern Railroad, now building and designed to form a link in a through east and west line, to connect the Tennessee river, at Guntersville, Alabama, with the Atlantic coast. The mineral resources of the country surrounding Fort Payne are exceptional. Rich iron ores abound, and lime- stone of excellent quality, suitable for furnace flux and easily quarried, is found in abundance in the immediate vicinity of the city ; while coal for all manufacturing and domestic purposes, and of fine coking quality, and in abundant supply, is readily obtained from the mines near by. In addition to its deposits of iron ore, coal and limestone, numerous and valuable deposits of fire clays, flint, kaoline and terra cotta clays have been found and opened in the Fort Payne mineral fields ; also, sand stones of excellent colors, and which are easily quarried. Very valuable woods, including Spanish, red, white and water oaks, hickory, poplar and black gum, and, in some sections, ash and pine, are found on Lookont and Sand mountains, adapted to building and the manufacture of furni- ture. The mineral resources of Fort Payne constitute its greatest wealth ; but the agricultural value of the valleys and plateans of the county, when properly developed, will add greatly to the aggregate value of that region. Wherever these lands have been cultivated, they have yielded good
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