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Book Reviews Blocton: The History of an Alabama Coal Mining Town. By Charles Edward Adams. Brierfield Cahaba Trace Commission, 2001. xi, 339 pp. $30.00 plus shipping, $5.00 one book, $3.00 each additional book. Available from Cahaba Trace Commission, 13728 Montevallo Road, Brierfield, AL 35035. ISBN 0-9711-9130-1. “There is not another town like West Blocton anywhere in the world. It may be an out of the way place and the people may not have a lot of money, but the little spot on the map is the richest place I’ve ever been to” (p. 305). These telling words of a West Blocton resident neatly encapsulate the essence of Charles Edward Adams’s work, Blocton: The History of an Alabama Coal Mining Town. Highlighting Blocton’s colorful past through a series of vignettes and anecdotal evidence, Adams, the Conference Director in Continuing Education at the University of Alabama and a native of West Blocton, brings to life local residents and details the complex web of economic, social, and political relationships of this small town. Located in Bibb County and named for the distinctive one-ton blocks of coal drawn from local mines, Blocton began its history as a company town. Founded in 1884 by Truman H. Aldrich, the president of the Cahaba Coal Company, Blocton and its sister town West Blocton (incorporated in 1901) “grew rapidly in the 1880s and 1890s into a bustling commercial, service, and residential center” (p. 5). Despite labor disputes at the turn of the early twentieth century—notably the coal strikes of 1894, 1904, and 1919—and a disastrous fire on July 12, 1927, that destroyed West Blocton’s commercial district, Adams’s hundred-year history conveys the resilience, vivacity, and thriving local spirit of the town’s residents. Although Adams carefully describes the grueling and often dangerous conditions at the mines, he focuses on Blocton’s vibrant multicultural atmosphere and community events. Most of the miners were of British ancestry, but the towns also boasted a thriving Italian community and a plethora of successful Jewish residents. Drawing on local newspaper accounts and interviews with residents, Adams contends that organizations and local gatherings provided a vital social outlet for the miners and their families. This rich community life manifested itself through fraternal lodges—such as the Free Masons, Order of the Odd Fellows, and T H E A L A B A M A R E V I E W 60 the Knights of the Pythias—and the union organizations of the Knights of Labor and the United Mine Workers. Furthermore, residents took immense pride in the victories of West Blocton High School’s athletic teams and marching band. According to Adams, Blocton’s history as a company town allowed it to “lay claim to a number of ‘firsts,’” notably, Bibb County’s first savings bank (Blocton Savings Bank, 1892), the first public school (1903), the first moving picture theater (1907), and the first hospital (1910; p. 119). These important local achievements demonstrate the significance of Blocton’s progress in comparison with other developing towns. Although he attempts to place the history of Blocton within a broader context of international and national events, Adams continually privileges local happenings. World War I is described as a time of “prosperity, patriotism, the departure of young male citizens for army and navy service , and finally, a triumphal celebration at war’s end.” In contrast, the Vietnam War is framed in the context of Blocton’s struggle over a low water supply (p. 131). Even more troubling, after describing an uneventful school integration in 1967, Adams highlights “The Elks Lodge[’s] . . . first homecoming banquet in six years in 1967. The Elks were boasting of a remodeled club, fully air-conditioned with a new dance floor” (p. 275). Although this localized and sometimes celebratory interpretation of Blocton’s history may be a reflection of available sources (local newspapers, letters, and interviews), an expansion of Adams’s analysis would help place Blocton within the broader context of Alabama and even national history. Furthermore, his description of African American miners as “Negro laborers” and blacklegs as “non-union Negro workers” suggests that this...

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