Exploring Montgomery

The storytelling continues… a collection of stories and photos from Exploring Montgomery!

Government

It was built in 1994, the same year that its identical twin, the Rufus Lewis Branch, was erected out on the Mobile Highway at the head of Air Base Blvd. Tit for tat. Step into one of these and you feel like you have entered a fortress. What has our […]

E. L. Lowder Regional Branch Library

June 1, 2018 in Education / Government tagged library / lowder

The structure, now remodeled and expanded, was built some dozen years ago as the Advanced Medical Imaging Center. For the previous 65 years the Housing Authority had its home out on Bell Street, having grown out of the emergency housing development thrown up in the late 1930s to support the […]

Montgomery Housing Authority

May 21, 2018 in Government tagged authority / housing

The APLS (Alabama Public Library Service) is actually two-story and deceptively large, was built 1976, and is a separate State Department created to assist (and rule over) public libraries throughout Alabama. It was started way back in 1939, probably by Marie Bankhead Owen, as a small arm of her Archives […]

Alabama Public Library Service

March 12, 2018 in Education / Government tagged apls / library

This rather ordinary metal building at 6000 Monticello Drive may not deserve much attention, but it holds big memories for some of us. It was put up in the early 1970s, and for well over a decade it was the home of the Lampliter Dinner Theater. It featured tiered seating […]

Lampliter Dinner Theater

February 16, 2018 in Commercial / Government tagged dinner / lampliter / theater

built this structure at 1021 Madison Avenue (directly opposite the Bibb Graves Armory) in the early 1950s, complete with the awful insertion of glass block. But despite that faux pas, it has this slight Federal Style feel, and appears somewhat staid to be a Shriner redoubt. I do understand that […]

Alcazar Shrine

February 12, 2018 in Commercial / Government tagged alcazar / shrine

sits directly across the street from the Brick-a-Day Church, and houses the Police Dept, the City Jail and City Court. It was built in 1966; before that City Court was held in the small Council Chamber at City Hall (recently abandoned in favor of new quarters on Court Square in […]

City Municipal Building

November 24, 2017 in Government tagged court / municipal / police

located in the woods just off Perry Hill Road at its juncture with Interstate I-85. California style. This is the initial building of a 9-building campus, probably planted in the mid 1980s. The Alabama Mental Health Dept was located out here in ca 1989, until it was brought back downtown […]

Interstate Office Park

October 2, 2017 in Commercial / Government tagged interstate park

The first of the six white concrete buildings that surround the State Capitol. You should ask how Archives ever got the first building. Well, it was like this: Marie Bankhead Owen 1869-1954 was instrumental in forming Alabama’s Archives Department in 1901, the first of its kind in the nation. She […]

The Archives and History Building

September 25, 2017 in Government tagged archives / history

Rosa Parks Museum — is part of the Troy campus, and it stands at the corner of Montgomery and Moulton Streets, directly across from the old Paramount (Davis Theater). It occupies the former site of the Empire Theater, and is contiguous to the very bus stop made famous when Rosa Parks was arrested there […]

Rosa Parks Museum

May 8, 2017 in Education / Government / Places and Things tagged boycott / museum / parks / rosa / troy

East Montgomery Library — Back in the 1950s, when Bear Brothers Land Co was developing Coliseum Blvd and Eastbrook Shopping Center, they donated a 12-acre parcel of that land to the city as a public park. The city accepted and named it Bear Park. Less than a decade later, when Federal Judge Frank Johnson […]

East Montgomery Branch Library

April 7, 2017 in Education / Government tagged bear park / branch / east / library

1 Dexter — Oh, the memories a single picture can bring. But note that it is no longer Court Square, its name for almost 200 years; it is now named for that scoundrel Andrew Dexter. Essentially, what we see is the one-time Pizitz Department Store. Pizitz bet on downtown; Lovemans bet on Normandale. […]

One Dexter Plaza

April 3, 2017 in Commercial / Government tagged court / dexter / one / plaza / square

Crump Center — Oh, the irony of it all. A couple years ago the Crump Center, a City-operated redoubt for the Still-Agile-Elderly, was moved from its former smallish Elizabethan Style home on Highland Avenue, way out onto Federal (now Congressman Dickinson) Drive, past the Coliseum. Today the center holds forth in this huge, […]

Crump Center

December 26, 2016 in Commercial / Government tagged center / crump / police

Downtown Post Office — on Catoma Street sits directly opposite the Davis Building on the site of the old Davis Motor Co (whose mechanic wrecked my Pontiac in 1953, when he took it from the shop to run a personal errand). This was built in 1977, during the Carter Administration, when our “real Post […]

Downtown Post Office

December 12, 2016 in Government tagged downtown / office / post

Sage Blockhouse — The 4-story reinforced concrete blockhouse . . . at Gunter Annex was constructed in 1957 as part of a hush-hush AF system which was to provide early warning of a Soviet nuclear attack. Us citizens were sure this facility would lead the Soviets to target Montgomery if they decided to attack. […]

Sage Blockhouse

December 9, 2016 in Government tagged blockhouse / computer / nuclear / sage

Powder Magazine — was built in 1862 as a safe place to store gun powder, like in out-of-town. The windowless structure has 2-foot thick brick walls, and still has its original slate roof. The walls are plain, except for an elaborate brickwork frieze. It is located in “Powder Magazine Park”, just off Bell […]

Powder Magazine

November 14, 2016 in Government / Places and Things tagged gun powder / magazine / powder

Kilby Prison — In 1970 the Old Kilby Prison was nearing its demise, but still in operation. It was Alabama’s Alcatraz, built 1922, huge, forbidding, located only 4 miles from downtown on a site that is now the NE corner of old Federal Drive and Coliseum Blvd. Its 20-foot high, 6-foot thick perimeter […]

Old Kilby Prison

October 24, 2016 in Government tagged kilby / prison

State Trooper Licensing — out on Coliseum Boulevard. It was built in 1954. Alabama’s Trooper unit was created in 1935 as The Alabama Highway Patrol, back when Bibb Graves was governor. It began with 74 officers, who underwent a ten day crash course at the Gay-Teague Hotel on Commerce Street. Gov Graves intended that […]

State Trooper Licensing Unit

September 26, 2016 in Government tagged license / state / trooper

Supreme Court — as seen from the RSA Tower in 1994, soon after the Court was completed. A handsome building, perhaps Palladian style. The Dexter Ave Methodist Church is in the foreground, and the RSA’s Alabama Center for Commerce is in the background. The structure incorporates grand concepts. Its huge lobby features a […]

Supreme Court Building

September 12, 2016 in Government tagged 10 commandments / court / dome / supreme

former health lab — on the AUM campus, prominent from I-85, was built in 1986. The Alabama Department of Forensic Science now has a new central Alabama lab facility on the ASU campus, and the depicted structure presently houses the State Health Lab. The construction of the pictured lab, 25 years ago, spawned a […]

Former State Forensics Lab

August 12, 2016 in Government tagged forensics / former / health / lab

Bldg 1402 — the Air Command and Staff College of the Air Force “Air University”. The University was founded in 1946, the same year the USAF was established as a separate branch of our Armed Services. Construction of the University campus (known locally as the “Academic Circle”) began in 1950 as a series […]

Maxwell’s Building 1402

August 1, 2016 in Education / Government tagged 1402 / air command / maxwell / staff college

Municipal Airport Terminal — The old Municipal Airport Terminal still stands on Gunter Annex to Maxwell AFB, reminding us that the Montgomery Municipal Airport, later named for Mayor Bill Gunter, was built in 1929. The 600-acre airfield had a grass landing strip, and this combination hanger- terminal building. Mayor Gunter, a flying enthusiast, was so […]

Old Municipal Airport Terminal

July 29, 2016 in Government tagged airforce / airport / gunter / maxwell / terminal

State Capitol — The State Capitol was built by the City of Montgomery in 1847 (it burned two years later and was rebuilt from the same plans) to house the fledging State government, then only 27 years old. What a rich history it has! The Succession Convention of 1860; the organization of the Confederacy; the […]

State Capitol Complex

June 27, 2016 in Government tagged aerial / capitol / confederate / jefferson davis / patterson / sims / wyeth

Forensics Lab — on the corner of Norman Bridge and Carter Hill Roads, was completed recently. It anchors the SW corner of the ASU campus, and signals the conclusion of a political struggle that extended over a decade. For years Forensics was the underfunded stepchild of State government, and had to choose between […]

State Forensics Lab

June 17, 2016 in Government tagged forensics / lab

Lurleen Wallace Building — For years the Lurleen Wallace Office Building was known simply as “The State Office Building”. It was designed by the prestigious firm of Warren, Knight & Davis of Birmingham to compliment the Public Safety Building it faces, and was completed in 1954. Local architects supposedly had the job but were supplanted […]

Lurleen Wallace Office Building

May 23, 2016 in Government tagged lurleen / office / state / wallace

County Health Department — at 3060 Mobile Highway was built by the County Commission in 1994. It is operated under the authority of the State Health Department (Mobile and Jefferson County Health Departments are independent). The first floor of this building is one of six primary health care centers in our county, and it […]

County Health Department

May 20, 2016 in Government tagged county / health

Public Safety Building — Thats what we call it now, but it was the State Highway Dept when it was built, back when the state teachers only taught, and the AHD ran the state. This was the second of the six buildings that surround our State Capitol, and is the one that set the […]

Public Safety Building

May 9, 2016 in Government tagged department of public safety / dps / safety / state highway department

County Jails — The new jail (on the right) connects to the old jail (on the left) via a bridge across McDonough Street. The new facility, with its 700 bed capacity, brings the total capacity up to 1100. That’s hard to believe, considering that for 30 years 1957-1986 our county jail capacity […]

County Jails

May 6, 2016 in Government tagged county / jail