Walker County, Alabama

By Pat Morrison

Walker County is a unique place inhabited by a unique people. Characters including George "Goober" Lindsey, Tallulah Bankhead, Sybil Gibson, and Eric "Butterbean" Esch, and communities including Cordova, Carbon Hill, and Day's Gap and Horse Creek-or as we know them today, Oakman and Dora-have all contributed to the county's rich history. In this volume of vintage postcard images, readers will learn how the town of Jasper avoided extinction, visit the old Walker County Courthouse that burned six times, and discover which town in Walker County began as Bald Eagle.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
• Release date: Sep 22, 2004
• ISBN: 9781439629666

Pat Morrison

Author and retired Walker County educator Pat Morrison has compiled an engaging collection of postcards and supplemented them with historic photographs to tell the story of this sometimes progressive, sometimes chaotic, but always fascinating place.

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INTRODUCTION

We came to Walker County in 1968, expecting to be here for a maximum of 2 years; yet here it is 36 years later, and we’re still here. What persuaded us to stay is the same reason I’m writing this book: the people of Walker County. They are unique in their friendliness, sincerity, and work ethic. They epitomize all that is good about the South. They are always willing to lend a hand to those who are less fortunate than they are, and their generosity knows no bounds. They are sincere about their faith, family, and football, and they are willing to make a commitment to all three. Finally, they have a work ethic born out of necessity. They have learned from their ancestors, who lived on the edge of frontier America, how to survive under all conditions.

My interest in postcards began a number of years ago as I occasionally looked to add to my brother Billyfrank’s collection. He had been a serious collector for over 25 years. As I looked I would sometimes find a Walker County card, and I would toss it in my desk drawer at school. I had no concrete plan in mind for them, so they were basically forgotten. As I cleared out my desk upon retirement, I rediscovered these cards and a plan gradually began to emerge. My true passion began when I received about 20 Walker County postcards from Konnie Godfrey, an entrepreneur and one of my former students, who had purchased part of the Siddie and Ethel Sellers estate. My passion was ignited, and from that point on I was hooked on local postcards. I am first and foremost a postcard collector, but that passion has flowed over into historic photographs and an interest in the history of Walker County. Out of this passion emerged the desire to author this book.

The whole of Walker County is rich in history, although we sometimes let this fact become obscured by our familiarity with the area. Like most places, when we are young, we cannot wait to get away, but we find that the place we are going has all the same characteristics as the place we left. It is not the place with which we are dissatisfied; it is with ourselves. Then as adults, we come back looking for the things that made us happy in our youth, but they are no longer there either. Places like Sherer’s Drive-In, where we had so many good times as teenagers, no longer survive, and Johnny Mack, Mouth of the South, no longer toot-a-loos the passing cars from the window overlooking the parking lot and highway. The old Japer Movie Theatre where we attended the Popeye Club on Saturday mornings and later had our first date has been torn down and replaced by a store, and her sister, the Pastime Theatre in Carbon Hill, has been destroyed by fire and not replaced at all. The Tallulah Hotel is falling down, and old downtown Dora is gone completely. Even the legendary Clear Creek Falls where our parents and grandparents went a Kodaking now lies beneath 100 feet of water because of the construction of the Lewis Smith Dam.

Railroads came to the county in 1884 and would make or break the small struggling communities, since development followed the railroads. Mining came even earlier to Walker County and has been another main reason for the development of the county. Most were small-scale miners who were trying to eke out a living with a pick, shovel, and if they were lucky, a mule. Most have disappeared over the years. Some have grown into mega-companies, but they all had humble beginnings. We have had our share of strikes, fights, and labor disputes, but we have come out much stronger because of the experience. There was once hardly a family that was not touched by some branch of the coal industry or did not depend on the success of coal. Today we have a much more diverse, industry-based economy with top schools, recreation facilities, parks, shopping malls, and now even two super Wal-Marts and a Home Depot. We’ve come a long way.

This book will teach you that the first car in Walker County was a 1907 Maxwell, which took 11 hours to drive the 40 miles from Birmingham to Jasper, and that much of Jasper was burned by the Yankees during the Civil War. Discover that Indian Head Mill in Cordova had a day-care program for its working mothers over 100 years ago, and that Walker County was named for Alabama’s first United States senator. Learn which town was divided down the middle of Main Street—the east side owned and controlled by one family, and the west side owned and controlled by another.

Enter the penny postcard: with its pictures it awakened our memories of old or educated us about the things that once were. Images of the Sumiton prison camp, President Roosevelt in Jasper, and the Cordova flood fill the pages of this book. Without postcards and postcard collectors to keep these images and memories alive, we risk losing a part of our heritage with each passing generation. Deltiology is the official name of collecting postcards, but I believe it is actually an addiction to the collecting and saving of local history.

I hope that as you look through the pages of this book you will have old memories rekindled, and each one of you will add to the story of Walker County by reminiscing with old friends or telling stories long forgotten to your children or grandchildren. So sit back, relax, and enjoy a ride into the past that might not have been possible had someone not saved that little 3.5 by 5.5–inch piece of paper called the penny postcard.

OLD NUMBER 29 LOCOMOTIVE. This steam locomotive, used to haul coal to railheads across Alabama, symbolizes the rail and coal industry in Walker County. During its prime, it steamed busily around the county. Then, in 1957, it made its last run,