The Birmingham age-herald., 1923-12-23
Despite Progressiveness, It Still CIings To Many Ira ditions And Landmarks Of Good Old Days

MONTGOMERY, Ala, Dec. a. (By Associated Press. s.)-Observer s say the new south Is striding for ward in progress; it's mills and fac tories, and steel and iron, its cotton and agricultural products and min erals placing 1t at the fore. But still preserved in the historic capital of the Confederacy there Is a delightful spirit of the old south which the visitor feels immediately upon ar rival
 Unlike its sister to the north-Bir- mingham-or other cities of the south, Montgomery today still clings to many of the traditions and harks back to many of the events, affairs and customs of 1860, those inspecting find.
 Dexter avenue, where legend says the first electric street car ever tested in America was operated, still retains much of the picturesquenes of 1S48, when the thoroughfare was crowded and bustling with cotton wagons with African slaves perched high, on the crest of the snow-white staple, and when the plantation owners transacted their business down on lower Commerce street, leading down to the Alabama river.
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 old Commerce Street.
 Ancient buildings still line the lower Commerce street way, a hub bub now of wholesale life and dis tributing point for surrounding terri tory. It's cobbled street still rattles and rasps to the rolling wheels of the drayman's cart or the trolley as it makes it's schedule of the district.
 Old Union station greets the stranger with it's air and appearance of age dating back to the days of the Confederate government when Jeff ferson Davis and other notables of state alighted and mounted the railway steps.
 The Alabama river, in plain view to the rear of the station and the winding streets of the state capital to the front, denote age. In the dis tance, the dome of the capitol on Goat Hill," where more than three score years ago the assemblymen of the state declared Alabama no more an intergral part of the Union, but a member of the new southern nation that was destined for four years to battle its way against unsurmount- able obstacles.
 Historic Buildings.
 There, on Commerce street, Is the hotel with its falcade from which President Davis spoke to the crowds In the SlTeeL DelOW, there IS the headquarters building on the opposite corner where the orders for the first shot fired at Fort Sumter, s. C., were issued and the War of the States be- gan; there the building in which Marcus de Lafayette was entertained in the early 1S00's.
 Commerce street abruptly ends; it merges into Court Square, marked by a fountain in the center-a fount that has stood the passing half-cen- tury and more in a fair state of preservation. Dexter avenue, Court street, Montgomery street and North Court street, too, meet In the circle that has long borne the title Court Square"
 Looking up historic Dexter. the stranger sees the gray front of the broad state capitol with it's dome that has been acclaimed by archi- tects as a work of art. Low-lying stores, few of them more than three stories in height, turn back the pages of the past. Towering sky scrapers. 50 common of other cities, are missing; the low vista bespeaks, the visitor agrees, of day gone-of a literal yesterday.
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 Homes Are Stately.
 Every street crossing Dexter runs through residence sections;s still stately and dignified. though vaguely