At the same time a profound movement toward diversification was afoot. The huffing and puffing of Birmingham's legendary iron and steel mills was gradually replaced by a work force o medical and engineering professionals. Today, Birmingham enjoys a balance of manufacturing and service-oriented jobs in a thriving work force. In Depth Birmingham has been through a lot for a city so young. Unlike many older cities, Birmingham, now in its 128th year, is still in the stages of becoming.
Local historians divide the city's history into six epochs.
The first, from the 1830s to the late 1860s, was a time when the area we now know as Birmingham was called Elyton and was just a small pioneer farm settlement. The second period, from about 1870 to 1880, was a time when railroads and land barons built a town that was named Birmingham, after England's industrial giant. Formally organized in 1871, the new town became a commercial hub, with railroads crisscrossing throughout the community. It also was a time when older Alabama cities began to resent the growth and success of their neighbor to the north. Their scorn subsided somewhat when the town was nearly wiped out, first by a cholera epidemic and then by economic depression.