02/20/09

Photo Gallery: Birmingham, AL

Most pictures below focus on specific locations: the Smithfield Neighborhood, the 4th & 15th Streets Business District, Kelly Ingram Park, the Sloss Furnaces, and Vulcan Park.

For information on the locations featured in this gallery, see below.

Vulcan Park:

Sloss Furnaces:

Powell School:

9/11 Memorial Walk:

McWayne Center (Penny Savings Bank):

Alabama Theatre:

4th & 15th Business District:

Kelly Ingram Park:

16th Street Baptist Church:

AG Gaston Gardens and Hotel:

Smithfield Neighborhood:

Smithfield Neighborhood

Ninth Street North to Third Avenue West
Historic marker at corner of
Eighth Avenue North and Center Street

Smithfield was developed in the early 1900s as a neighborhood for prominent black professionals. Many homes in the district were designed by notable black architect Wallace A. Rayfield. Also in Smithfield is Parker High School, Birmingham's first high school for African-American students.

Fourth Avenue Business District

Fourth Avenue North from 15th to 18th Street

The neighborhood along Fourth Avenue from 15th to 18th Streets North developed as the city's black business district in the early part of the 1900s. Forced out by Jim Crow segregation and white-owned stores that did not welcome them as customers, African-American businessmen established their own retail, social and cultural center here. Black-owned banks, mortuaries, movie theaters and nightclubs flourished along the corridor through the 1960s. Some continue to this day.

Kelly Ingram Park (originally known as West Park)

Sixth Avenue North at 16th Street

Distinguished as "A Place of Revolution and Reconciliation," historic Kelly Ingram Park serves as a threshold to the Civil Rights District. During the Civil Rights Movement, this public park became the focal point of a grassroots resistance to the inhumanities of racism and discrimination by law and by custom. Events which took place in Kelly Ingram Park vividly portrayed the realities of police dogs and fire hoses turned on marchers who gathered for civil rights demonstrations in the 1960's. These very images, which shocked the country and the world, proved to be instrumental in overturning legal segregation in the nation. Sculptures commissioned for the park depict attacks on demonstrators, children jailed for their role in the protests, and a tribute to the clergy's contributions to the movement. In sharp contrast to scenes from the 60's, all paths on Freedom Walk converge on its center, a peaceful and meditative life spring of hope.

Sloss Furnaces

In 1882, Sloss Furnaces began producing iron and did not stop until ninety years later. Over the decades, Sloss Furnaces gave rise to the city of Birmingham and served as a battleground for economic, employment and social reform. Now recognized as a National Historic Landmark, Sloss Furnaces is open to the public as a museum of industry which speaks to the contributions of the working men who labored there. With its massive furnaces, web of pipes, and tall smokestacks, it offers us a glimpse into the great industrial past of the South and our nation.

Vulcan Park

The Vulcan statue is the largest cast iron statue in the world and the symbol of Birmingham, Alabama. The 56 foot (17 m) tall statue depicts the Roman god Vulcan, god of the fire and forge. It was created as Birmingham's entry at the 1904 World's Fair in St. Louis, Missouri and is the largest statue ever constructed in the United States. It is the second-largest statue standing in the United States behind the Statue of Liberty.