Local History

The mom and pop grocery stores of yesteryear will always be memories in the hearts of those who operated them and the customers who traded with them. Ezekiel’s Grocery at the Quarry was one of those stores. Several other Sylacauga families whose names you will...

Where did that running pig go?  Everyone in Sylacauga loved the sign that said Old Hickory and the little pig that was always running.  He had a lasting impact on this city in the days that Sylacauga was on the Florida Short Route.  The old Birmingham...

The year was 1968 and Dean Martin was a popular television personality. It was the year his popular weekly summer programs began featuring a group of young, beautiful,  singers and dancers called the Golddiggers, an idea from a group that originated in the...

It’s that special time of year when school is starting again.  I can almost smell new blue jeans and see those shiny new pencils, book bags, and pointy new crayons. I can close my eyes and smell the shiny waxed  floors, so clean that even a small child hated...

Sylacauga is a much changed city because society has changed! Nothing brings the past in focus as much as the present. Our Marble Festival promoted a walking tour, but upon arriving downtown Saturday morning, there were no visible walkers. Many people were in their...

School is off to a rocky start again this year, and everyone has an opinion about the best way to do it. All who are involved were so in hopes we could get off to a “normal” school, whatever that is. If you are a believer, continue to pray with me for our country and...

With one election behind us, and a municipal run-off election next month, there is more talk about candidates and issues than action. Elections are important, and they definitely wake people up to the issues that are at stake; but these same people who are screaming...

I love the history of our area, and sometimes I accidentally discover something that is just so unusual that I cannot let it go without a little more research. We have a treasury of history about Avondale Mills and the people who lived or worked there; and B. B. Comer...

We know that sound in Sylacauga, and even at Lake Joy I can hear the train coming up Trammell Hill across 511 in the edge of the Talladega National Forest. We had overnight guests from Fairhope who got quite alarmed in the early morning hours when they heard that...

Railroad tracks run right through the center of  Sylacauga, and most of us have grown up waving at the man in the caboose and hearing our parents complain about having to wait for the train to clear the crossing. If you were a student at Sylacauga High School in the...

Go back with me in time to the years during and after World War II when every family did not own a car, and compare that to today when two or three cars are parked in every carport or at every house. Cars were scarce during and after the War, and gasoline and tires...

The City Bus Line in Sylacauga served a real need in this area in days gone by. Last week we looked at a schedule printed in the Sylacauga Advance in 1946. I was glad to hear from Becky Blair whose grandfather, Lon Rudd, was one of those early drivers. Mr. Rudd also...

Sylacauga Post Office Sylacauga Post office to me suggests remembrances of people and place and a time that is long gone, but still very special. I am certainly not the first person to try to look back at those earlier days, way before any of us lived, and try to...

Early Schools and Churches in Sylacauga             Once people began moving to Sylacauga, a place to worship together became important. Col. George Hill organized a church on his property on the Old...

Christmas Trivia Little girls with $1.00 a week allowances had three good Five and Dimes in which to shop in the 1950’s. Can you name them?In what Yankee newspaper was the “Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus” letter published and guess what year? A bonus if you...

Fifty Years of Christmas             Fifty years, fifty Christmas trees, fifty Christmas mornings on Dogwood Road, fittingly located at Lake Joy; and I wonder how the time flew by so quickly,...

An Attitude of Gratitude For Sylacauga Then and Now November is the month for thanking God for health, family, friends, and all the other blessings that He gives us that we may take for granted.  One of these blessings is the privilege of living in Sylacauga. It...

Paul Michael Bourboulas Little Paul’s Café The first hint of what sort of person a man is, may be how he treats his mother. Paul Bourboulas wrote a touching card to his Mother and sister, Maria, when he arrived in the United States in October, 1918. He would have...