Archival
Collections
Alabama Coal Miners
Oral History Interviews
(AR 1492)
Bound transcripts and supporting
documentation of interviews conducted by Carl
Elliott, Sr. in the 1970s,
primarily dealing with black lung disease.
Size: 7 volumes
Alabama Coal Operators’
Association/Alabama Mining Institute
Records, 1908-1984
(AR 916)
The origin of the Alabama Coal
Operators' Association can be traced to June 1900 when
officials of several Alabama coal mining and steel
companies met in Birmingham to discuss wage-scale
negotiations with coal miners organized under the
United Mine Workers (UMW). In 1908, the association
organized and drafted a constitution. In response to
mounting labor tensions, the ACOA adopted an open-shop
policy and refused to recognize the United Mine
Workers. In response, the UMW called a strike. On
August 10, 1908, this strike was defeated through the
intervention of Governor B.B. Comer who forbid the
union to hold meetings and ordered the state militia to
raze the mine workers' makeshift tent settlement. The
ACOA also defeated the UMW in the later strikes of 1917
and 1919 and in the strike of 1920-1921. Aside from its
concerns with labor problems, the ACOA advocated the
general interests of the coal companies. It worked to
improve mine safety, to import new technology, and to
keep tax assessments on mineral lands low. The
association opposed regulation of corporation
wage-scales and commissary prices. With labor tensions
considerably eased after the turmoil of earlier years,
the AMI turned its attention to promoting the interests
of Alabama coal mining companies. In 1992, the AMI
became the Alabama Coal Association. The records
contain minutes, proceedings, publications,
correspondence, the constitution, annual reports of the
Alabama Mining Institute, annual reports from the State
Inspectors of Coal Mines, and subject files. The
subject files consist of newspaper articles, speeches,
reports, and pamphlets.
Size: 5 boxes
Big Warrior Coal Company
Minute Book, 1921-1922 and 1926
(AR 1317)
Size: 1 volume
Birmingham Railway Supply Company
Business Records, 1888-1902
(AR 34)
This collection includes a minute
book for 1889-1902; an unused stock certificate book; a
receipt book for 1891-1894; a payroll book for 1891;
and a shop labor record for 1888-1890.
Size: 1 box
Birmingham Railway Supply Company
Records, 1889-1899
(AR 848)
This collection contains two cash
books and one foundry cast book.
Size: 3 boxes
Black Diamond Coal Company
Miscellaneous Records, 1949-1976
(AR 1430)
This collection does not contain
the complete records of the company. The collection
contains correspondence, maps and other material
relating to The Club, Valley View Mine, Altamont Park,
Red Mountain Tunnel (proposed but never built), Hammond
Mines, and East Mall (constructed as Century Plaza
shopping mall).
Size: 1 box
Blair, Arthur J.
Papers, 1916, 1939-1975
(AR 1451)
Material relating to Blair’s
activities as president of Black Diamond Coal
Company and as a geologist.
Size: 1 box
Bloomer, John
Birmingham Business History Files,
1901-1980
(AR 818)
This collection contains
historical documentation collected by Bloomer for the
business history sections of the
book The Valley and the Hills by Leah Rawls
Atkins. The files include material
on 46 Birmingham area businesses.
Size: 2 boxes
Bowron, James
Scrapbooks, 1877-1928
(AR 101)
These scrapbooks contain newspaper
clippings and other material relating to the history
and activities of the Tennessee Coal, Iron and Railroad
Company in Alabama and Tennessee.
Size: 3 volumes
Brownell, Charles A.
Papers, 1898-1942
(AR 64)
Charles Brownell founded Brownell
Auto Company, the first Ford Motor Company agency in
Alabama. This collection includes personal
correspondence between Brownell and friends and family,
correspondence relating to his automobile business and
material relating to a biography of Henry Ford that
Brownell authored.
Size: 2 boxes
Comer, James McDonald
Avondale Mills Office Files,
1920-1958
(AR 7)
James McDonald "Donald"
Comer, one of nine children of Braxton Bragg Comer
(governor of Alabama and later senator), was born on a
Barbour County, Alabama, plantation in 1877. In 1890,
the family moved to Birmingham. Donald Comer served in
the U.S. Army in the Philippines for four years, 1898
– 1902, and returned home and became
Secretary-Treasurer of B.B. Comer & Sons, a
corporation that ran the family's plantation. When his
father was inaugurated to the governorship in 1907,
Comer became Secretary of Avondale Mills, a textile
manufacturing firm founded by B.B. Comer. In 1927 Comer
became president and treasurer of the company, which in
time would employ about 7,000 people and produce a wide
variety of cotton goods. In addition, Comer served on
the boards of numerous firms — business,
charitable, and educational — both locally and
nationally. In 1936 he was elected President of the
American Cotton Manufacturers Association. This
collection includes the records of the business
operations of the cotton mills from 1920 to about 1939,
and more general correspondence covering a later
period. The first 128 boxes of the collection are
largely filled with bills, receipts, requisitions,
letters of inquiry and application, financial, legal,
and banking papers, and routine business
correspondence. The remaining boxes are comprised
mostly of correspondence reflecting Comer's interest in
the health of the textiles industry, foreign
competition in this market, and social and economic
situations in the South.
Size: 146 boxes
Fowler, Thomas
“Time Book No. 1, At the
Coal Mines Shelby County, Ala.,” 1857-1864
(AR 1581)
This small volume, kept by a man
whose name appears to be Thomas Fowler,
contains time work records for coal mines in Shelby
County. The locations and owners of the mines are
unclear. The volume
also contains lists of provisions,
names and addresses, information relating to the
opening of a hotel in Pennsylvania, and miscellaneous
notes.
Size: 1 volume
Hammond Iron Company
“Report on Examination of
Accounts of Hammond Iron Company,” 1926-1939
(AR 1576)
Size: 1 box
Hayes Aircraft Corporation
Scrapbook, 1952-1959
(AR 1500)
This scrapbook includes newspaper
clippings describing labor unrest at Hayes, a
Birmingham aircraft modification facility.
Size: 1 volume
Hayes International Corporation
Records, 1951-1984
(AR 982)
This collection contains minutes
of meetings for the Board of Directors and Stockholders
for Hayes International and related companies.
Size: 6 boxes
