This is our third and final story featuring Red Mountain in Birmingham. The statue of Vulcan has been standing on a pedestal above lone pine gap on Red Mountain since 1939. Not long after that, he would be seen holding a green or red popsicle until 1999 when he came down from the mountain for a much-needed refurbishment and not because of the end of the world mentioned in episode 4. This is the story of the neon “torch,” why it was there and not the spear we see him holding today.This is our final story of season 2 of the Alabama Short Stories podcast. We hope to be back sooner rather than later for season 3. Keep your eye open by staying subscribed to the podcast or visiting the website. I hope you have enjoyed this labor of love to the state that I have called home all my life.Support the PodcastThe podcast is free but it’s not cheap. If you enjoy Alabama Short Stories, there are a few ways you can support us. Tell a friend about the podcast. Buy some merchandise from the Art Done Wright store at https://www.teepublic.com/user/wright-artMake a donation to the podcast. You can find links in the footer at  AlabamaShortStories.com. You can listen to the podcast on the website or wherever you prefer to listen and subscribe to podcasts.  Support the show (https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/shawnwrightAL)

Alabama Short Stories

Vulcan's Torch

Originally from North Carolina, William Rufus King would move to Alabama and become instrumental in the establishment of Alabama as a state, writing the first constitution and creating Alabama. He would also serve the country at the national level as well. He became Vice-President of the United States with President Franklin Pierce, but he would never serve a day. This is King’s story on the Alabama Short Stories podcast.Support the PodcastThe podcast is free but it’s not cheap. If you enjoy Alabama Short Stories, there are a few ways you can support us. Tell a friend about the podcast. Buy some merchandise from the Art Done Wright store at https://www.teepublic.com/user/wright-artMake a donation to the podcast. You can find links in the footer at  AlabamaShortStories.com. You can listen to the podcast on the website or wherever you prefer to listen and subscribe to podcasts.  Support the show (https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/shawnwrightAL)

William Rufus King – Alabama’s Vice President

In season 1, we learned about a man from Germany who moved to Alabama to paint portraits. We also learned about a woman who painted on spider webs. In this episode of the Alabama Short Stories podcast, we learn about a man who painted on an entirely different canvas, the roofs of barns. If you have ever seen a barn roof promoting Rock City, then Byers and his crew painted it. He was born in Alabama and lived in Georgia and Tennessee. He would come home to open Sequoyah Caverns, using the marketing skills he learned working with Rock City. This is his story.Support the PodcastThe podcast is free but it’s not cheap. If you enjoy Alabama Short Stories, there are a few ways you can support us. Tell a friend about the podcast. Buy some merchandise from the Art Done Wright store at https://www.teepublic.com/user/wright-artMake a donation to the podcast. You can find links in the footer at  AlabamaShortStories.com. You can listen to the podcast on the website or wherever you prefer to listen and subscribe to podcasts.  Support the show (https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/shawnwrightAL)

Clark Byers sees Rock City

Andrew Jackson Beard was born a slave on a plantation near Pinson, Alabama. After gaining his freedom, he went on to become a farmer, millwright, and prolific inventor. Even though he could not read or write, Beard went on to own patents for plows, rotary engines and was to make trains safer and more efficient, becoming a millionaire in the process. This is his story on the Alabama Short Stories podcast.Support the PodcastThe podcast is free but it’s not cheap. If you enjoy Alabama Short Stories, there are a few ways you can support us. Tell a friend about the podcast. Buy some merchandise from the Art Done Wright store at https://www.teepublic.com/user/wright-artMake a donation to the podcast. You can find links in the footer at  AlabamaShortStories.com. You can listen to the podcast on the website or wherever you prefer to listen and subscribe to podcasts.  Support the show (https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/shawnwrightAL)

Andrew Jackson Beard – Inventor

This is our second story about Red Mountain this season and it is about the actual mountain. For decades there had been talk about tunneling through the mountain to help travelers coming from Homewood, Mountain Brook, and towns to the south. Officials even brought in a famous New York tunnel engineer to assess the plans. Finally, someone suggested they cut a slice out of the mountain and the rest is history. Not only was travel over the mountain improved, but the Red Mountain Expressway Cut was designated as a National Natural Landmark by the United States Department of Interior and as a National Site of Geological Interest by the American Geological Institute. The strata exposed by the cut were formed over 160 million years of geologic time. Support the PodcastThe podcast is free but it’s not cheap. If you enjoy Alabama Short Stories, there are a few ways you can support us. Tell a friend about the podcast. Buy some merchandise from the Art Done Wright store at https://www.teepublic.com/user/wright-artMake a donation to the podcast. You can find links in the footer at  AlabamaShortStories.com. You can listen to the podcast on the website or wherever you prefer to listen and subscribe to podcasts.  Support the show (https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/shawnwrightAL)

The Cut in Red Mountain

Tuscumbia native Tom Hendrix had learned about his relatives through the stories his grandmother would tell him. A trip to Oklahoma and a meeting with a woman named Minnie Long would change the course of his life. 8.5 million pounds of stone later, Hendrix had finished a project to honor his great-great-grandmother Te-lah-nay. This is their story on this episode of the Alabama Short Stories podcast. Support the PodcastThe podcast is free but it’s not cheap. If you enjoy Alabama Short Stories, there are a few ways you can support us. Tell a friend about the podcast. Buy some merchandise from the Art Done Wright store at https://www.teepublic.com/user/wright-artMake a donation to the podcast. You can find links in the footer at  AlabamaShortStories.com. You can listen to the podcast on the website or wherever you prefer to listen and subscribe to podcasts.  Support the show (https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/shawnwrightAL)

The Wichahpi Commemorative Stone Wall – Tom’s Wall

What do you do when it’s December 31, 1999, and the end of the world is upon you? You celebrate at Birmingham’s iconic The Club of course, where the view of the apocalypse is unsurpassed. This is the story of the private club, “The Club” and the Y2K problem when our robot-overlords would soon rise up. This is the first story of three that happen along Red Mountain in Birmingham on the Alabama Short Stories podcast.Support the PodcastThe podcast is free but it’s not cheap. If you enjoy Alabama Short Stories, there are a few ways you can support us. Tell a friend about the podcast. Buy some merchandise from the Art Done Wright store at https://www.teepublic.com/user/wright-artMake a donation to the podcast. You can find links in the footer at  AlabamaShortStories.com. You can listen to the podcast on the website or wherever you prefer to listen and subscribe to podcasts.  Support the show (https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/shawnwrightAL)

The Club at the End of the World

John Pratt lived in the sleepy town of Centre, Alabama where he was a writer, lawyer, and teacher. He eventually owned and edited the local paper. Pratt wrote a lot in his many careers. So much so that in an effort to cut down on the writer’s cramp, he invented a machine to write for him. In this episode of the Alabama Short Stories podcast, we learn about John Pratt’s road to inventing the typewriter.Support the PodcastThe podcast is free but it’s not cheap. If you enjoy Alabama Short Stories, there are a few ways you can support us. Tell a friend about the podcast. Buy some merchandise from the Art Done Wright store at https://www.teepublic.com/user/wright-artMake a donation to the podcast. You can find links in the footer at  AlabamaShortStories.com. You can listen to the podcast on the website or wherever you prefer to listen and subscribe to podcasts.  Support the show (https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/shawnwrightAL)

John Pratt - Inventor of the Typewriter

When you think of ice hockey, you don’t think of Birmingham, Alabama. At least you didn’t in the mid-1970s when the Birmingham Bulls of the WHA came to town. For the next few seasons, some of the greatest hockey players of all time would come to the civic center coliseum including Bobby Hull, Wayne Gretzky, and the subject of this episode, Gordie Howe. In a professional career that started in 1946, Howe would score one of his most iconic goals in his career in the football capital of the south. This is his story on the Alabama Short Stories podcastSupport the PodcastThe podcast is free but it’s not cheap. If you enjoy Alabama Short Stories, there are a few ways you can support us. Tell a friend about the podcast. Buy some merchandise from the Art Done Wright store at https://www.teepublic.com/user/wright-artMake a donation to the podcast. You can find links in the footer at  AlabamaShortStories.com. You can listen to the podcast on the website or wherever you prefer to listen and subscribe to podcasts.  Support the show (https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/shawnwrightAL)

Gordie Howe scores a goal

What do Erskine Hawkins, Sun Ra and Cleve Eaton all have in common? They were all students of Fess Whatley, famed Birmingham band leader at A.H. Parker High School. Whatley would end up training musicians that would populate some of the largest bands during his teaching tenure. Learn about Fess Whatley and student Erskine Hawkins in this, the first episode of Season 2 of the Alabama Short Stories podcast.Support the PodcastThe podcast is free but it’s not cheap. If you enjoy Alabama Short Stories, there are a few ways you can support us. Tell a friend about the podcast. Buy some merchandise from the Art Done Wright store at https://www.teepublic.com/user/wright-artMake a donation to the podcast. You can find links in the footer at  AlabamaShortStories.com. You can listen to the podcast on the website or wherever you prefer to listen and subscribe to podcasts.  Support the show (https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/shawnwrightAL)

Fess Whatley

Welcome to Alabama Short Stories Season 2. I’m your host, Shawn Wright.We have another season of great Alabama short stories that you may not have learned about in your Alabama Civics class or read in books. We have stories about the inventor of the typewriter and the Janney coupler used on trains. Both men were successful in their own ways, and they came from entirely different backgrounds.I tell stories about a man who spent his life on the highways of the south painting on barns and another man who spent a big part of his life building the largest stack wall in the world to honor a relative. There are stories of Alabama’s only United States vice-president and a band director who taught and influenced some of the most renowned musicians of the past century. We have a story about a Canadian hockey player whose major milestone will be forever linked with the football capital of the south. And finally, there are three stories on the same mountain. One story is about going through the mountain instead of going around it. Another is about Vulcan’s famous popsicle that would be lit in green or red depending upon the day’s events. And there is the story of The Club at the end of the world. When you are faced with the apocalypse, it’s time to party. I hope you will join me for season 2 and if you haven’t heard season one just yet, make sure you listen to those stories as well. You can listen to the podcast at AlabamaShortStories.com or wherever you prefer to listen to podcasts. I’ll see you at Alabama Short Stories.Help Support Alabama Short StoriesThe Alabama Short Stories podcast is free but it&apos;s not cheap. You can help the podcast by making a donation at my PayPal link or better yet, purchase some of our products from the store. You can buy shirts, stickers, and accessories at TeePublic.com.  You will not only find Alabama Short Stories merchandise but other southern-inspired designs as well. Shop the store at Tee Public, https://www.teepublic.com/user/wright-art.Donate at PayPal, https://paypal.me/shawnwrightALSupport the show (https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/shawnwrightAL)

Alabama Short Stories Season 2 Teaser

Some of the people we will talk about on Alabama Shorts Stories are inventors. You may be surprised at all the items that were created right here in Alabama. The windshield wiper for instance. This simple idea was a game-changer and today we probably take the windshield wiper for granted. As the saying goes, "you don&apos;t miss it until they&apos;re gone." In this final episode of season 1 of Alabama Short Stories, we learn about Mary Anderson and how a cold and rainy trip to New York City gave her the inspiration to create the windshield wiper. Support the show (https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/shawnwrightAL)

Mary Anderson: Inventor of the Windshield Wiper

Birmingham has its share of statues around town. There are statues of people in Kelly Ingram Park, Linn Park, the UAB campus, Samford&apos;s Campus, the Birmingham Museum of Art, Five Points South, Rickwood Field, and the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame. Even Eddie Kendricks of the Temptations is on 4th Avenue North at 18th Street. I could go on and on about statues around town. The big three in Birmingham are Vulcan, Miss Electra, and Miss Liberty. And until 1989, they could see each other from their perches in and around downtown Birmingham. Our subject on this episode of Alabama Short Stories is Miss Liberty. Learn why she is in Birmingham, her journey to get here and why she relocated to the suburbs.Support the show (https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/shawnwrightAL)

Birmingham's Miss Liberty

In an earlier episode of the Alabama Short Stories podcast, we talked about the painter William Frye. An artist who learned the ways of the masters at Heidelberg University in Prague, Bohemia (now the Czech Republic) and painted on traditional mediums such as stretched canvas. In this episode, we learn about Huntsville&apos;s own Anne Clopton. A self-taught painter, Clopton took a different path and chose to paint on spider webs.Find out about her choice of medium and why she chose a spider web on this episode.Support the show (https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/shawnwrightAL)

She Painted on Spider Webs

My parents have a set of portraits hanging in their living room of Ephraim H. Foster and his wife Susan A. Watkins. My third great-grandparents. Painted before the civil war, these portraits were passed down in the family to their daughter Bettie Foster. To her daughter, Susie Pointer, then to my grandmother Elizabeth Malone and finally to my father. Interest in these portraits was instrumental in me learning more about my family history. Portraits have always been more than a record. They have also been used to show power, wealth, social standing, or some other qualities of the sitter. It is also all we had before the invention of the camera. A medium that would eventually let everyone, no matter their class or wealth, keep a record of who they were. Portrait artists were not just in the capitals and largest cities of our nation; they were all over, even in the Antebellum South.This episode is about the artist. A man who traveled a long way to Alabama for his profession.Support the show (https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/shawnwrightAL)

The Portraits of William Frye

Alabama Shorts Stories takes over where our 4th grade Alabama history class left off. We dig a little deeper and find the stories that make Alabama a unique place to live and to visit. It's the perfect listen for when you are a little behind on your Alabama history.

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Alabama Short Stories

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