Palisadian. [volume] (Cliffside Park, N.J.) 1906-current, 1915-10-09

Whatever lOT uOuDIlHS hall HlllllOn
by 1925, and it ought not to be much
of an effort at that.
Reads Like Romance
To tell the story of Birmingham
within the brief limits of village
newspaper, or even metropolitan
newspaper, would be a hopeless task.
The town is barely more than forty
years old now, so that as the lives of
important cities run, it is still in
swaddling clothes-at least still in
knee breeches. In the early seventies it
got it's start, and by 1882 had be-
gun to crawl with the establishment
of the original Schloss iron furnace
The hills around bulged with brown
hematite ore on one side, and lime
rock on the other. Then down in the
earth underneath were the Warrior
and Cahaba coal fields, more than
5000 square miles, or bigger ter
ritory than all of Connecticut-noth-
ing but coal!
After long struggle, almost forty
years of struggle, Birmingham be-
gan to see the light of a new day,
the dawn of new era. The great
steel interests finally saw the blaz-
ing furnaces from afar, and taking
over the Tennessee Coal and Iron
Company, a financial coup that Roose-
welt helped along by not frowning
upon measure coupled with much
doubt as to the moral status in turn
ing it over to the steel trust, and then
Birmingham-the real Birmingham
arose from it's long sleep. 1t wasn't
a Phoenix-like arising, nor yet Rip
Van Wrinkle awakening, but rather a
coming to life from a state of dor
ment inaction that had puzzled the
Birmingham dreamers no less than it
had amazed those who knew the
great forces that lay in Jones' val
ley undeveloped yet impotent.
Great Latent Power
The steel interests have now just
begun to develop the power latent in
Birmingham. Within a year past
about $5,000,000 has been expended
in their plants. The wire industry
| of America is a great product. The
steel interests have big wire mills
at Worcester, Mass, Cleveland, and
Pittsburgh, and now their latest mill
the very last word in perfected
| wire manufacture is at Birmingham
Three New BenzOl Plants
The European war has largely
| benefited Birmingham, also. In adj
| dition to filling tremendously large
| orders for shrapnel and shells, in
mills running day and night, three
big, new plants for the manufacture
OF benzol have only recently started.
| One of these by the Steel people
cost $1,000,OOO, another by the Wood
| ward Iron Works, cost $1,000,000,
and a third by Edison, cost over
100000. Benzol is a by-product of
iron manufacture which was for
merly wasted. 1t is made of Stag,
| useless, then later it went into the
| into benzol. Edison looked the coun-
try over for his plant and found
Birmingham the most available Of
all. Benzol is what makes German
| dyes no longer necessary to import.
Limitless Resources
This is only an incident of Birm-
| ingham's resources. Coal and iron
ore and lime rock in close proximity
are what form the city's great power,
in previous and present-day perform
ance. The industries are already so
big that the weekly payroll is ST.
| 100000, and this amount of money
turned loose in any city would make
things hum.
| Residences Revelation
So Birmingham grows and pros
pers. took an automobile ride
around the city. 1t was a revelation.
1t was the greatest treat | have en-
| joyed in many years, and one of the
greatest surprises. The topography
of Birmingham is such that the
business section is in the flat por-
ton of Jones' valley, the residential
section on the outlying hills. Red
Mountain, several hundred feet above
the city on the east, is a long
mountain chain bordering that
side of the city, and it is a solid
mass of iron ore. These hills give
the widest scope for landscape and
residential architecture. There are
more beautiful homes in Birmingham
than in any American city of the
same size There are half a dozen
suburban sections filled with costly
examples of modern homes, and rid
ing through Norwood, say, and look
ing at the beautiful winding boule-
ward there, one instinctively feels
that that is the section set aside for
the wealth of the city. But con-
tinuing on to the opposite side of
town the picturesque Highland ave-
nue. section opens up as wonderful u
suburb as was ever planned. The
roadWays all curve and wind up and
down grade until one is completely
lost as to direction, and as the sec
ton unfolds, the feeling forces itself
that nothing could be more beautiful.
But then, there finally comes an end
to Highland avenue at last with its
sectional cross places and winding
roadways that make it all mystic
maze. In little while your auto
host tells you you are now in an en-
tirely new section where the homes,
if anything, are more elaborate, the
grounds more enticing, the parking
and gardens more beautiful. And