Two Shelby County Bank Robberies in the 1930s

Bank robberies in the United States have been declining now for decades. In 1992, 9540 were reported to the FBI. In 2023, the number had fallen to 1362. Why bother to rob a bank when you can sit at home with your laptop and commit all sorts of crimes?

In the 1920s and especially during the Great Depression years of the 1930s, however, bank robberies became a thing, so much so that the FBI was created and the act made a federal crime in 1934. This era produced such famous names as Bonnie and Clyde, John Dillinger, Pretty Boy Floyd and Machine Gun Kelly.

In 2023 I posted an item on the Great Hartselle Bank Robbery of 1926. Just after midnight on Monday, March 15, 1926, eight men arrived and proceeded to cut telephone and telegraph lines, severing the town from the outside world. The Bank of Hartselle safe was dynamited and $14,000 in cash, gold and silver left town with the robbers. The crime was never solved. 

The articles below give initial descriptions of two Shelby County bank robberies. More than one criminal was involved in the first in Wilsonville in 1931; $4700 was taken. A single robber made off with $14,000 in Columbiana the following year.  Both of these banks were insured and quickly resumed business as usual.

Alabama seems to have been rich ground for bank robberies during this period. The Library of Congress' Chronicling America newspaper site pulls up some 6200 hits when searching "Alabama" and "bank robbery" during the 1920s and 1930s. How many of those events actually took place in the state would require some time to determine, however. I did not find either of these robberies when limiting the search to the towns involved. 

Shelby County Reporter 26 March 1931 via Newspapers.com 

Shelby County Reporter 10 November 1932 via Newspapers.com 

Paul Bryant Museum in Tuscaloosa

On a pleasant day in January 2023, my son Amos and I made a trip to Tuscaloosa. He especially wanted to visit the Bryant Museum, and this piece reports on that visit. We also toured the grounds of the old state capitol ruins; I've written about that experience here and here.

The Bryant Museum was our first stop. Below I've included a few of the many photographs I took during the visit. I couldn't include more; there was just too much red--er, crimson. I'm an Auburn fan.

Despite that, I enjoyed the visit. I find the early history of football in the U.S. to be very interesting, and of course, this program has played and continues to play a major role in state history. I remember my maternal grandfather and Methodist minister John Miller Shores telling stories about listening to the radio as Alabama's football teams won games in the Rose Bowl on the west coast in the 1920s and 1930s. Those wins were a source of pride for so many residents of the poor state of Alabama.

I digress. Naturally, this museum has lots of space devoted to all the teams, coaches and players of the pre- and post-Bryant eras. Every coach except Mike Price gets some coverage, and I imagine they've updated the Nick Saban portion since we visited. 

Stop by the museum if you get the chance. Even non-Alabama fans might enjoy it. 

The museum includes a rather large exhibit devoted to Crimson Tide softball. Only a portion is seen here. 

Naturally there's a gift shop.

Mailed from Montgomery in 1944

You just never know what will turn up in old newspapers. In going through our parents' house in Huntsville in 2023 and 2024, we found a large cache of World War II issues of the Gadsden Times. Our paternal grandmother had apparently saved hundreds of front pages from that publication. Thus what we found was that page and three others of each day's issue. She didn't bother to detach the front page from the larger sheet. Dad brought these papers back to Huntsville when he cleaned out his mother's home in Gadsden after her death in 1997. 

The war news day-by-day is fascinating, but a lot of interesting local and state items pop up as well. This post has one of them, from the Times issue of January 25, 1944. That headline grabbed me right away. Apparently postal authorities in Memphis on January 18 opened an unclaimed parcel post package mailed from Montgomery on January 8. Inside was the infant's body, wrapped in a January 7 Montgomery newspaper, a towel from a hotel in the city and some brown wrapping paper. 

Two women in Montgomery were being questioned by Temple Seibels, Circuit Solicitor. No charges have been brought as yet, but Seibels vowed to prosecute if evidence from the state toxicologist indicated murder or "birth by unnatural means". 

Seibels is the only person named in this article. His Find-A-Grave entry identifies him as William Temple Seibels [1873-1960]. He apparently held the office a long time; the 1923 Alabama official register lists him as the Solicitor of the 15th Judicial Circuit in Montgomery County. A circuit solicitor was responsible for the prosecution of criminal cases within a judicial circuit. 

I wonder how this event played out. In 1989 I published a book entitled Criminal Activity in the Deep South, 1700-1930: An Annotated Bibliography. In putting that book together I came across some really bizarre crimes and criminals, but I don't remember anything quite like this one--assuming a crime was indeed committed. Further research in Montgomery newspapers or court records might give an answer. 

That 25 cents seen on the lower right was the cost of a weekly subscription delivered by carrier, not a daily issue. 

Source: Find-A-Grave

A 1940 Socialist Union Party Flyer in Gadsden

As brother Richard and I cleaned out Mom and Dad's house in Huntsville during 2023 and 2024, we found lots of interesting family memorabilia and a few really unexpected items. This flyer falls into the latter category.

We found it in material Dad brought from Gadsden after his mother Rosa Mae Wright died in 1993. My grandfather Amos J. Wright, Sr., worked for the L&N Railroad there for many years, most of them as a yard foreman. One of his duties included checking boxcars to make sure they were completely empty. Perhaps he found it in one of those. If so, why he kept it is a mystery. Perhaps it came into their family papers some other way.

The Socialist Union Party was one of several small groups spun out of the Socialist Labor Party in the 1930s. These organizations were known as De Leonist after Daniel De Leon, an early leader in the SLP, which was the first socialist political party in America and founded in 1876. In the mid-1930s Abraham Ziegler was expelled from the SLP and joined another De Leonist group that soon faded. Then he and a few others started the SUP in 1939; it lasted until 1941. 

This anti-conscription flyer is dated August 1940. An address is given for the Socialist Union Party, 140 Fourth Avenue, Brooklyn. As far as I could determine from Google Maps, the building still exists, located between Luna's Tire Shop and a Papa John's Pizza. According to the Wikipedia article on "Conscription in the United States", support for compulsory military service for young men was building in the country in the summer of 1940 as the war in Europe heated up.

Given the Scottsboro Boys trials and labor organization/unrest history in the state, the American Communist Party was very active in Alabama in the 1930s and beyond. For detailed information see Robin D. Kelley's Hammer and Hoe: Alabama Communists during the Great Depression [2015] and Mary Stanton’s book Red, Black, White: The Alabama Communist Party, 1930–1950 [2020]. I would imagine other political groups beyond Republicans and Democrats were also present in the state to one degree or another. This flyer would seem to be evidence about one little known socialist group at least.  

Random Alabama (1)

I've been wanting to start a new series on the blog featuring photos I have that are related to Alabama in some way but not really needing a long post. I decided to start with this item. 

Mom and Dad met at Auburn University back in the Alabama Polytechnic Institute days--but everybody called it Auburn even then, she used to tell me.  They acquired or were given a fair amount of "Auburnalia" over the years. These materials included books, DVDs, etc and some objets d'art such as this character. 

So what can we say? Here's a cowrie shell glued to a slice of a small tree limb and featuring AU's orange and blue colors and a beanie and pennant. Does this look like a frog to you?

I remember this piece sat on a shelf in Dad's basement study for many years. Maybe one day I'll share a few more of the Auburn oddities and memorabilia I have. In the meantime, the university's licensing people need to get this one into mass production. Bound to be a hit.....isn't retro cool now??