Sunday, November 17, 2024

Eddy Gilmore: From Selma to Russia and Back



Here we have another discovery that popped up recently as my brother Richard and I continued our journey through all the family materials at mom's house in Huntsville. Of course, what caught my attention first about this October 6, 1953 Look magazine was actress Ava Gardner on the cover. Duh. But as I examined the issue, I also found a long article on Alabama native Eddy Gilmore and his Russian ballerina wife Tamara. You just never know what will turn up where. I'd read a bit about Gilmore in the past, so I decided to do this blog post and explore his life and career some more.

Eddy Lanier King Gilmore was born in Selma on May 28, 1907. I found little about his family via Ancestry.com. His father was Edwin Lanier Gilmore and mother Evelyn B. "Emely" King Gilmore. That at least explains his two middle names. I did find Edwin's World War I draft registration card, which listed him as a traveling salesman for the C.W. Cooper Company, wholesale grocers. Indicative of his future profession was Eddy's job as a young boy--delivering newspapers for the Selma Times-Journal. 

Gilmore graduated in 1928 from Carnegie Tech in Pittsburgh, founded by Andrew Carnegie and now Carnegie Mellon University. He worked at the Atlanta Journal until 1932 and then the Washington Daily News until the Associated Press hired him sometime before 1940. Soon the AP sent him to the Soviet Union as bureau chief where he lived until 1953. Thus he covered the Eastern Front of World War II as the Soviets battled Nazi Germany.

During his time in the country he interviewed Joseph Stalin; that piece won him the 1947 Pulitzer Price for Telegraphic Reporting-International. Gilmore spent most of the rest of his life working for the AP in London, He died there of a heart attack at his East Grinstead country home after a day at work on October 6, 1967. Several people who knew him noted that he never lost his Southern accent. 

While living in the Soviet Union Gilmore met and fell in love with Tamara Kolb Chernashova, a ballerina with the Bolshoi Ballet. Soviet citizens were not supposed to fraternize with foreigners, but their relationship persisted despite government refusals to let them marry. They were finally able to wed in 1950, but unable to leave the country until after Stalin's death in 1953. The couple would have three daughters and a son. After leaving the Soviet Union Gilmore often wrote about the royals of Europe he met, both their glamour and the reality. 

The Look magazine article features Eddy and Tamara describing life in the Soviet Union--the prices of foods and clothing, the salaries earned by different workers, etc. A pair of quotes from Tamara struck me. 

"I am a Russian, sometimes happy, sometimes sad. It is a big and strange and mysterious country, even to Russians, but it is our land. It's not for me to criticize."

"When we came away, it was first Stockholm, and then Paris and then New York and then Alabama. They are nice, these places. I would like to go again to Paris."

I don't know about Tamara visiting Alabama again, but Eddy's body was returned to Selma for a funeral service and burial. See below for more images and information.

In 1968 Tamara published Me and My American Husband. She remained in London until her death on April 15, 1980; she was 52, 20 years younger than Eddy. 

A 2014 article about "Selma's forgotten Pulitzer Prize-winner" can be read here and the Associated Press' obituary here. Some of his papers are held by Syracuse University.






















Gilmore's grave in Live Oak Cemetery, Selma. According to an Episcopal Diocese record I found via Ancestry.com, his burial service was held at St. Paul's Episcopal Church in that city. 

Source: Find-A-Grave














Tamara's grave in Gunnersbury Cemetery, Greater London

Source: Find-A-Grave







Via Ancestry.com I found Gilmore's World War II draft registration card, which he filled out on October 16, 1940. At the time he was living in Silver Springs, Maryland, and working for the Associated Press. On the other side the personal description noted height as 6 feet, 205 lbs., with brown eyes and hair and a "ruddy" complexion. Oh, and the card gives next of kin as Mrs. Margaret Cook Gilmore, "wife", the first I've read about her. I was unable to find any more information. 









Sunday, November 10, 2024

Alabama's Centennial Half-Dollar




In 2019 I wrote a blog post about Alabama's 1919 statehood centennial celebrations. One of the featured items was a commemorative half-dollar coin issued by the U.S. Mint. In this post I wanted to delve a bit deeper into that coin's history.

The state legislature created the Alabama Centennial Commission in February 1919. Governor Thomas Kilby, inaugurated just the month before, became Chairman, and Marie Bankhead Owen, a well known figure in archival and historical circles, was named Secretary and Historian. She was the author of several plays and publications related to the centennial.  

The Commission asked U.S. Representative Lilius Bratton Rainey to introduce a bill in Congress calling for a commemorative coin to be issued. Rainey was on the board of directors of the state archives and thus known to both Marie Owen and her husband Thomas, state archivist. Congress passed the bill which was signed by President Wilson on May 10, 1920. The Wikipedia entry on the half-dollar has a detailed account of the legislative history. 

Gov. Kilby then created a three-member committee to come up with a design. Public input was accepted, but all of those suggestions were rejected. Kilby then recommended to the director of the mint a coin that would have the state capitol building on one side and James Monroe, president in 1819 when Alabama was admitted to the Union, and Woodrow Wilson on the other. The capitol building was rejected, and the seal of Alabama suggested as a substitute. 

In November 1920 Republican Warren Harding defeated Wilson in the presidential election. Owen then proposed the faces of Kilby and first governor William Wyatt Bibb. This substitution solved the problem of a Democrat on a coin issued by a Republication administration, and if Harding was added, a Republican president on a coin honoring strongly Democratic Alabama. 

At this point James Earle Fraser, a sculptor who had designed the Buffalo nickel and a member of the U.S. Commission on Fine Arts, suggested that his wife Laura Gardin Fraser, also a sculptor, create the final design. In September 1921 she delivered her version, and the U.S. Mint then issued the coin from its Philadelphia facility, although the coin has no mint mark.

Some 5000 of the coins were issued with a "2x2" mark added since Alabama had been the 22nd state admitted to the Union. A large number of "plain" coins, 64,038, were also struck. Five thousand of those "plain" ones were eventually returned to the mint and melted. 

President Harding journeyed to Birmingham for the initial sale on October 26, 1921, nearly two years after the end of the centennial year. The commemorative coins cost one dollar each and were sold from special booths constructed along the streets downtown. Harding spoke on race relations to the segregated crowd. While in the city he also laid the cornerstone for a new Masonic temple. Harding had arrived on October 24 and most of his visit revolved around the city's semi-centennial. 

This coin proved to be important in the history of American coinage. The half-dollar was the first U.S. coin to feature a living individual and the first to be designed by a woman. One of the plain coins in excellent condition sold in 2014 for over $7300. 

Laura Fraser [born in Chicago on September 14, 1889, died August 13, 1966] designed not only coins and medals, but also created large sculptures. An example in Baltimore features Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson and has been controversial in recent years. 

Alabama's first governor was William Wyatt Bibb [October 2, 1781-July 10, 1820] who served 1819-1820. He had held political offices in Georgia before appointment by President James Monroe as Governor of the newly-created Alabama Territory in 1817. 

Thomas E. Kilby [July 9, 1865-October 22, 1943] was governor 1919-1923. One of his progressive efforts was to improve prison conditions. The state's new prison which opened in 1922 was named after him and operated until demolished in 1970. Kilby was a successful businessman in Anniston who also ran for the U.S. Senate twice but was defeated by Hugo Black both times. 












Thomas E. Kilby's official portrait

Source: Encyclopedia of Alabama



Portrait of William Wyatt Bibb

Source: Encyclopedia of Alabama 



Laura Gardin Fraser




President Harding arrives in Birmingham on October 24, 1921, and driven in a Premocar, manufactured in the city by the Preston Motors Corporation





President Harding speaks to the crowd on October 26, 1921, the first day of the commemorative coin's sale. 

Source: Wikipedia





Sunday, November 3, 2024

Old Bryce Hospital Cemetery in 1978




My brother Richard Wright recently found these slides taken years ago, and I have digitized them for this blog post, among other uses. He took the photos in 1978, in the summer from the look of the grass. They show views of grave markers in the oldest of the four cemeteries associated with Bryce Hospital in Tuscaloosa, the "River Road" or simply the Old Bryce Cemetery. 

Richard wanted the digitals to send to Matt Gage, Director of the Office of Archaeological Research at the University of Alabama Museums. We had talked about them in July when Matt and Carey Oakley, a former director of OAR, came to Huntsville to pick up the final batch of dad's artifacts being donated to OAR. When I emailed them to Matt, his response was fascinating:

"It’s amazing how between 1978 and the first time I saw it in the late 90s all the iron markers had been laid down and the cemetery looked totally different. Today, none of the iron markers are up. The concrete markers with the patient number and comments are mostly overgrown in saplings. When UA was in the process of updating the fraternity houses and demolishing the houses in front of the stadium, they brought us a box of the markers that was found in the basement of one frat. We have no clue where the graves are they were associated with."

In another email, Matt noted:

"The portion of the cemetery included in the photos are north of Jack Warner Parkway. When they built Jack Warner (formerly River Road), they moved the graves from the construction area only. Those to the north, which Richard photographed, were left in place. So now the cemetery is basically cut in half.

The markers that he photographed were then moved or stolen, so it doesn’t look like that anymore. Some of the iron markers are laid flat by the crews doing the mowing so they could go over the top. Some of these markers can be found under the grass root mat. Some were taken by fraternity pledges and souvenir seekers."


Matt suggested I contact Steve Davis, Historian for the Alabama Department of Mental Health and someone who really knows Bryce history. Part of his response further explains  the situation:


"This cemetery is usually referred to as the Old Bryce Cemetery. It once spanned an area which is now jack Warner Parkway and was once called River Road.  In 1967 the City of Tuscaloosa moved approximately 1289 graves to what is now called Cemetery 1-A. In 1922 Bryce had started a new cemetery East of the Old Cemetery that is now known as Cemetery #2 and in 1954 cleared land nearby for what is Cemetery #3.

 

"There simply are few primary sources concerning the old or original cemetery. There is no known cemetery book or plot map. The information on patients buried there is in individual patient records that because of HIPAA and Alabama Statute are not available to the public. There was a patient death in December of 1861 and documentation of a death and burial in the cemetery in January of 1862. Some records have handwritten notes that have date and time of death with burial location and some simply state 'patient died'. Since death certificates were not mandatory in Alabama until 1906 it is virtually impossible to determine exactly who and how many patients were buried in the old cemetery.

 

"When the 'new' cemetery now named Cemetery 2 was created in April of !922 there had been approximately 6,000 deaths at Bryce.  (Circa 5,900 deaths at the end of FY 1921, 6,100 at the end of FY1922 with April being halfway through FY22) Because of deaths reported to the Tuscaloosa Court House from 1892-1902 we know 85 % of reported deaths were buried at the hospital. Cemetery #2 did have a burial list and we know the number of deaths from annual reports so can determine that 52% if patients that died in 1923 were buried at Bryce. I say all that to try to give credence to my guess that there at least 4,000 graves in the Old Cemetery. The Spanish Flu pandemic certainly would result in many more burials at the hospital just as the covid pandemic lead to four times as many burials as normal. That would also be close to the number of unmarked graves documented by GPR [ground-penetrating radar] by OAR.

 

"Patients were buried with markers that had their patient number. The original markers were headboards as described in the book, “An insight to an Insane Asylum” which was self-published in 1882 by a former patient. That would seem to indicate wood.

 

"Since patients were buried with just their patient number it does not really help to find a legible number except for that individual grave. If a patient was admitted in 1862 they would have a low patient number. If they lived for 30 years at Bryce and then were buried beside a patient that had been committed in 1892 the numbers could well be 17 and 4289 (chosen at random) there would be no numerical sequence to the graves.

 

"At some point the original markers were replaced with the iron ones that are also present in Mt. Vernon at the Searcy Hospital. I know this is all confusing so I will not even get into the history of the iron markers that are now at OAR and Bryce Hospital. I have a letter from the Superintendent of Bryce to a family inquiring about their ancestor’s grave dated 1943. He states that markers have become so weathered that it is not possible to locate their relative’s grave.

 

"Your [Richard's] photos provided are important in that they are dated. We have several photos of the Old Cemetery and 1-A but many are not dated so it is difficult to establish a pattern of vandalism, normal aging and maintenance .

 

"I went into this detail to show what we know and what we do not at this time. The first Bryce Cemetery was on the cliff overlooking the Black Warrior Rivers and by 1922 reached the mule barn on the Bryce Farm. When Highway 82 (McFarland Blvd) was rerouted with the Finnell Bridge there were almost certainly graves disturbed. When River Road was constructed, there were circa 1289 graves relocated without known documentation of the names or patient numbers being documented."


In paragraph four of his comments, Steve mentions the original grave markers as described in the book An Insight into an Insane Asylum by Joseph Camp, an elderly Methodist minister committed to Bryce by his family in 1881. After his release he self-published his account, which was reprinted by the University of Alabama Press in 2010. On pages 44-45 of that edition he describes visiting the cemetery to find the graves of two men he knew who had died at the hospital. He had numbers with their names, perhaps found in a register of deaths, and located them on "headboards" --numbered 647 and 740. 


I'll quote one of my previous blog posts for a bit about the history of Bryce Hospital:


In the 1840s American mental health crusader Dorothea Dix visited state legislatures--including Alabama's--attempting to improve the care of the mentally ill. The state legislature responded with a law in 1852 establishing the Alabama Insane Hospital. Some 326 acres in Tuscaloosa were purchased as the site of the hospital; the facility opened in 1859 with Peter Bryce as the first superintendent. Eight years after he died in 1892 the institution officially became Bryce Hospital.

By the end of World War II Bryce was so overcrowded and poorly funded that conditions reached a crisis. In 1972, a ruling in a federal court case changed psychiatric institutions around the country and many including Bryce began scaling down patient numbers and eventually closed. The University of Alabama now owns the property and has extensively redeveloped the original building into a welcome center, museum, and more. Another article on the history is here. Another facility in Tuscaloosa still operates as Bryce Hospital

I've written several pieces previously on this blog about Bryce. These include one on old photographs, a quick visit some of the family and I made to the hospital campus, a 1943 aerial view of the facility, a look at sewing and other fiber arts by patients there, and an early 2023 visit during the redevelopment efforts. 




























The photo above and the map below are from the Historical Marker Database.

 "Marker is on Jack Warner Parkway Northeast south of McFarland Blvd East (U.S. 82), on the right when traveling south. Marker located on the crest of a hill south of the McFarland Blvd East and Jack Warner Parkway Northeast interchange."




Sunday, October 27, 2024

Huntsville Photo: Whitesburg Drive-In Screen Burns in 1980



I stumbled across this photo recently on the state archives web site. Since I grew up in Huntsville [you can read about that here and here], it naturally captured my interest. The Whitesburg Drive-In Theater was an iconic place in Huntsville for many years; so what's going on here?

The Whitesburg opened on June 16, 1949 with room for 400 cars. Admission was 40 cents for adults and 10 cents for children over five. The first film shown was the 1947 release The Senator Was Indiscreet, a comedy also known as Mr. Ashton Was Indiscreet. The film starred William Powell and Ella Raines and was the only one directed by playwright George Kaufman. 

On September 30, 1979, the drive-in closed. By the next summer the owner asked the city to burn the 60-foot screen, fearful that deterioration made the structure unsafe. Thus in June 1980 the fire department did just that in front of about 100 onlookers, including the boys seen in the photo. 

My brother Richard and I remember going with our parents to this drive-in during the late 1950s and early 1960s. Mom would get us dressed in our pajamas so we would be ready for bed when we got home. 

The location remained an open field on Whitesburg Drive for many years. A row of cedar trees along that road identified the spot. The last time I was by there earlier this year something was being built on the property. 

Also included below are some other photos of the Whitesburg Drive-In. 













Source: Wikipedia






Sunday, October 20, 2024

Capitol Park and Old Tavern in Tuscaloosa (2)

This post is the second one of a pair devoted to photographs I took on a trip in January 2023 to Tuscaloosa with son Amos. Here's the intro from part one:

In October 2014 I posted an item on this blog about a trip my wife Dianne, daughter Becca and I made to Capitol Park in Tuscaloosa, the site of Alabama's state government from 1826 until 1846. Naturally I included many photographs taken on that bright sunny day in late August. 

In January 2023 my son Amos and I made a trip to T-town primarily to visit the Paul W. Bryant Museum. I'll be writing about that experience in a future post. In this two-part post I wanted to share some of the Capitol Park photographs; the overcast skies made it seem like a different place.

Alabama has had a series of capitals beginning with St. Stephens in 1817 during the territorial period. Since then Huntsville, Cahaba, Tuscaloosa, and Montgomery have been state capitals. 

The Encyclopedia of Alabama gives a succinct history of the Tuscaloosa structure:

"The ruins of one of Alabama's former state houses can be explored in Capitol Park near downtown TuscaloosaTuscaloosa County. The city was Alabama's seat of government from 1826 until 1846; the capitol was completed in 1829. After the state capital moved to MontgomeryMontgomery County, in 1846, the building was used by the Alabama Central Female College. The structure was destroyed by a fire in August 1923, leaving only broken columns, some areas of the foundation, and a section of wall."

Capitol Park is located on Childress Hill on the bluff above the Black Warrior River. Efforts to restore the site did not begin until until the late 1980s. The Old Tavern was built in 1827 and after use as a tavern and stagecoach inn served for many years as a private residence. In 1966 the structure was in danger of demolition but money was raised to move it to its current location. The Alabama Central Female College was a Baptist institution that began operation in the old capitol building in 1857. So far I have been unable to determine if it reopened after the 1923 fire. You can read an account of the fire in the August 23, 1923, Birmingham Age-Herald here.