Who Was Joseph H. Woolf, M.D.?

For some years now I've been seeing a family doctor at the UAB Family Medicine practice on 20th Street near Five Points South in the Community Health Services building. On recent visits I actually took note of the plaque below and wondered about Dr. Woolf. Let's investigate. 

The Department of Family and Community Medicine was established at UAB in 1975. The May 22, 1981, issue of the UAB Reporter noted the dedication on May 17 of the Family Practice Center in Dr. Woolf's name. The building is not named after him, just the FPC. Got that? Universities do things that way...

So, who was Dr. Woolf and what was his connection to UAB? The UAB Reporter article explained only that he was a doctor in rural Alabama. 

I did some research at Ancestry.com and elsewhere, but also found him included in an obscure reference book I have, Frank L. Grove's Library of Alabama Lives [1961]. Here's the entry:

"Woolf, Joseph Henry, physician, 403 Riddle Avenue, Piedmont. Born on April 29, 1901, in Calhoun County, at Piedmont, Alabama, he is the son of John P. and Nell (Kiernan) Woolf. Dr. Woolf attended Auburn University; University of Alabama; Tulane University, and the University of Illinois, earning the M.D. degree from the last named. On July 31, 1930, he married Maye Chew of Macon, Georgia. Dr. Woolf served his internship at Hillman Hospital, Birmingham, spending the following year at Union Memorial Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland. He began his practice of medicine in Piedmont in 1929, and is still thusly engaged. He served as the first Chief-of-Staff of the Piedmont Hospital which opened in June of 1957, and is presently a member of that Staff. Dr. Woolf holds the following professional memberships: American and Southern Medical Associations, Calhoun County Medical Society, Association of Southern Railway Surgeons, and State Medical Association. Politically, he is a Democrat; and his religious affiliation is Catholic. Reading is Dr. Woolf's recreation."

This material neatly sums up Dr. Woolf's life until the time of publication in 1961. Via Ancestry.com I found his  February 1942 registration for the draft in World War II. That document tells us he was 6'1" tall at the time, weighed 158 pounds and had hazel eyes and black hair. I have been unable to locate a photograph. He died on November 23, 1967.

Going by the biographical entry above, Dr. Woolf did his internship at Hillman Hospital probably in 1927. As noted below, the hospital is now part of the UAB Medical Center, and seems to be Dr. Woolf's only connection with UAB. Anyone with further specifics please tell us in the comments section. 

Additional notes are below some of the photographs. 


UPDATE October 27, 2018: In the summer of 2018 the UAB Family & Community Medicine Clinic moved to UAB Highlands Hospital on the other side of campus. The Clinic opened in its new location on July 31. What has happened to the Woolf facility name and this building on Southside is currently unknown.

Here's the view from inside the building lobby looking out at 20th Street. 

Dr. Woolf is buried in Highland Cemetery in Piedmont. 

Source: Find-A-Grave

Piedmont Hospital in 2017; the facility closed in the 1990's. There was some hope in 2012 of turning it into an adult day care facility, but that plan never materialized. In June 2017 a local doctor purchased the site for a future primary and urgent care clinic.

Source: WEIS Radio

The Hillman Hospital complex, ca. 1929. The original structure on the right was erected in 1902 and the annex, in the middle, was added in 1913. On the left is the 1928 addition, or “new” Hillman. The buildings today are part of the UAB Medical Center.

Source: Birmingham Public Library

Strange Things Found in Alabama Stores (2)

Here's my introduction to part 1 of this ongoing series:

Going through some photographs recently I came across a couple of examples of the random things I encounter here and there in stores and other public places. When I do I take photos. I've decided to share some of them in a series of posts on this blog.

These images may strike many as just silly, and some are, but I prefer to call them strange, weird, unexpected, something different springing out of the halls of American commerce. Or whatever. Let's begin. 

Feel free to tell us about your own strange finds in the comment section!

Children's toys sure can be weird sometimes, as exemplified by these two found in a Tuesday Morning store in Huntsville. "Meowlody, Daughter of a Firecat"?

We found this display box at Vintage Interiors in Pelham. What intrigued me was this message on the back. I wonder where that St. Joseph School was located.

These dolls were found creeping people out at Encore Resales in Pelham. 

Did you know that in some areas of the country boiled peanuts are only available in cans? This situation is shocking. These cans were on the shelf locally, but boiled peanuts are best hot from the kettle. We get ours at a little shop down US 31 toward Alabaster, Wayne's Produce. Yum, yum!

My wife Dianne is a big fan of Peeps, but sometimes the new flavors are just too strange for her. 

Easter Island came to Old Time Pottery in Pelham this past spring. 

Some More Early Alabama Songs

In June 2015 I posted an item on "Some Alabama Songs from the Early 20th Century." Since there are so many of these tunes from the late 19th and early 20th centuries, I thought I would look at a few more examples. There are plenty of others for additional posts as well. 

As I said then, "Alabama has inspired many songs over the decades by natives, residents and people who have never even visited the state. In June 2014 I wrote a post on some songs related to Birmingham. I'll be returning to this rich topic at some point in the future as well." So here I am. 

Discussions of each song are below. 

Source: New York Public Library 

The sheet music cover of this ditty from 1901 has several things to notice. There are stalks of wheat and in the lower left corner an outline map of the state. The tune is "That Famous Alabama Song" that has been "Sung with Great Success" by Zelma Rawlston, whose photograph adorns the middle of the sheet. 

The New York Public Library entry for the song gives this summary of the lyrics:  "A man standing on a pier looks at a boat named Alabama and reminisces about his home plantation; the ship's captain offers to take him back home and he returns to his plantation." You can find the sheet music with lyrics at the NYPL site. Frederick Allen Mills [1869-1948], the New York publisher, was also a ragtime composer in the early part of the 20th century.  

Will D. Cobb [1876-1930] was a lyricist and composer born in Philadelphia. Gus Edwards [1879-1945], a native of Germany, was a songwriter who also managed vaudeville theaters. He discovered a number of performers who went on to great fame such as Eddie Cantor and Groucho Marx. Bing Crosby played Edwards in the biopic The Star Maker [1939]. The pair also collaborated on five songs for a 1902 musical version of The Wizard of Oz. Rawlston was a popular singer of the day who often performed as a male impersonator. The page on Rawlston here has a different sheet music cover for this song with Rawlston in drag. 

Source: Mississippi State University Libraries

L.W. "Libbie" Mehr was married to Charles Mehr, who in the early 1920's opened Mehr's Music Store & Novelty Shop on 5th Avenue North in Birmingham. The store sold everything from sheet music and instruments to costumes and magic paraphernalia. Libbie helped her husband in the store and also wrote songs. "Alabama Blues" was one of those tunes. On June 10, 1922, the song was recorded by Mamie Smith's Jazz Hounds in New York City.

The song was published by Williams Music House in Birmingham, then located at 1818 3rd Avenue. The photo below shows the store on 4th Avenue North, after a move, probably before 1938.

Source: Birmingham Public Library 

Murray in 1899

Source: Library of Congress

Written and first recorded in 1915, "Alabama Jubilee" is considered an American standard and has been recorded many other times since by everyone from Chet Atkins to Roy Clark, Doc Watson, Leon Redbone and Jerry Lee Lewis. You can find the sheet music and lyrics here. Issued in March of that year, the sheet music quickly sold almost a million copies. 

George L. Cobb [1886-1942] wrote the music for "Alabama Jubilee" and Jack Yellen [1892-1991] wrote the lyrics. Cobb wrote over 200 musical compositions that include ragtimes, marches and waltzes. Much more about Cobb can be found here. Yellen also wrote the lyrics to a pair of other standards, "Happy Days Are Here Again" and "Ain't She Sweet" as well as songs and screenplays for many films and Broadway musicals.

Cobb and Yellen collaborated early in both their careers, beginning in 1909. Several of their collaborations were "Dixie" songs; others included "All Aboard for Dixieland" and "Are You from Dixie?" Yellen was Jewish, born in Poland and raised in Buffalo, New York. Cobb was born in New York state. Like creators of so many Alabama-related tunes from the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Cobb and Yellen wrote in popular genres using popular images of the day and may never have visited the South, much less Alabama. 

Elizabeth Murray was a musical and comedy performer in vaudeville. Jerome H. Remick [1867-1931] was a musical publisher based in Detroit. You can watch a version here of the song recorded in September 2015 by the Skip Parsons Riverboat Jazz Band. 

A few other recordings of "Alabama Jubilee" can be found here.

Source: New York Public Library

The sheet music of this song gives Harry "D." Miller as the composer, but that apparently should be Harry "S." Miller. He was born in Philadelphia in 1867, but spent most of his life as a prolific composer, lyricist and playwright in Chicago and New York. Some of Miller's other songs can be found here.

I have been unable to find any information on lyricist Edith Willard. Whitney-Warner Publishing Co. was purchased by Jerome H. Remick in 1898.

The Peerless Quartet was a male singing group that started in the 1890's and toured and recorded until 1928. They recorded hundreds of songs, enjoyed years of great popularity and are considered a major influence on the barbershop quartet style of singing. A massive list of their recordings from 1908 until 1920 is available. 

 The Quartet recorded "In Alabama, Dear, With You" on two different dates. The Victor recording shown above was made in Camden, New Jersey, on September 27, 1915. The group had also recorded the song on August 12 for Columbia. 

You can listen to the Victor recording here.

The Peerless Quartet recorded three other songs related to Alabama: "Take Me to My Alabam'" (October 3, 1916), "Musical Sam from Alabam'" (May 29, 1917, and February 28, 1918). and "Alabama Blacksheep (Won't You Return to My Fold)" (October 18, 1923). I'll be covering those in future entries in this blog series. 

The 20sJazz.com site has a recording of this song by the great Duke Ellington and His Kentucky Club Orchestra. That site gives this information about the personnel involved:

"This recording was produced in New York City on November 29th 1926 featuring Bubber Miley and Louis Metcalf trumpets, Joe Nanton trombone, Prince Robinson clarinet & tenor sax, Otto Hardwick clarinet, soprano, alto, & baritone sax, Duke Ellington piano & director, Fred Guy banjo, Bass Edwards tuba, and Sonny Greer drums."

Ellington and this group made two recordings of the tune, one on November 29, 1926, and the second on February 28, 1927, both in New York City for different companies, Vocalion and Brunswick.

A page of the sheet music is below. Also note the "New Birmingham Breakdown" recorded in the following decade.

As best I can determine, the Spanish phrase on the record, "El Quiebro de Birmingham" would translate literally as "The Sidestep of Birmingham". I presume it was included for the recording's distribution in Latin America, but I've yet to investigate that assumption.

Recorded March 5, 1937, in NYC



Several songs have associated the concepts of a woman, Alabama, and a rose. I discuss several of them below. 

Source: University of Alabama Libraries


This song written by composer Roy L. Burtch and lyricist Claude L. Barker appeared in 1910. A bit about Burtch can be learned from this 1905 marriage notice. Burtch and his bride Harriet were living in Indianapolis in 1905. I have been unable to find out anything about either Barker, or the young lady to whom the song is dedicated, "Miss Anna Louise Crews, Monrovia, California." The song was published by the Wulschner-Stewart Company founded in Indianapolis by Emil Wulschner in 1888. His stepson Alexander Stewart soon joined the company, which lasted until 1914. 

The sheet music cover of another song with the same title from 1913 can be found here. The cover says that song is by Milton Weil and Stanley Murray and issued by Tell Taylor Music Company. Weil owned a music company in Chicago during the 1920's and 1930's. William "Tell" Taylor [1876-1937] was a vaudeville performer and composer of more than 200 songs, including "Down By the Old Mill Stream". He founded his music publishing company in Chicago in 1907. I have been unable to find any information about Stanley Murray.

Then there is "Alabama Rose" by country singer Bobby Bare.

Silas Sexton Steele, a native of Philadelphia, started off as a actor in the mid-1830's but moved into writing, eventually creating more than 40 melodramas, comic operas, and musical burlesques. Two collections of these works can be found here. Many of these featured songs, including the 1846 "Rose of Alabama" which continues  to be performed and recorded today. 

Lyrics of that 1846 tune as recorded by Bobby Horton:


Away from Mississippi's vale,
With my ol' hat there for a sail,
I crossed upon a cotton bale,
To Rose of Alabamy.

Cho: Oh brown Rosie,
Rose of Alabamy.
A sweet tobacco posey
Is my Rose of Alabamy.
A sweet tobacco posey
Is my Rose of Alabamy.

I landed on the far sand bank,
I sat upon the hollow plank,
And there I made the banjo twank,
For Rose of Alabamy.

Oh, arter d'rectly bye and bye,
The moon rose white as Rosie's eye,
Den like a young coon out so sly,
Stole Rose of Alabamy.

I said sit down just where you please.
Upon my lap she took her ease.
"It's good to go upon the knees,"
Said Rose of Alabamy.

The river rose; the cricket sang,
The lightnin' bug did flash his wing,
Den like a rope my arms I fling,
'Round Rose of Alabamy.

We hugged how long I cannot tell.
My Rosie seemed to like it well.
My banjo in the river fell.
Oh Rose of Alabamy.

Like alligator after prey,
I jump in but it float away,
And all the while it seem to say,
"Oh Rose of Alabamy."

Now every night come rain or shower,
I hunt that banjo for an hour;
And see my sweet tobacco flower,
Oh Rose of Alabamy.

Oh fare thee well you belles of Spain,
And fare thee well to Liza Jane,
Your charms will all be put to shame,
By Rose of Alabamy




I have also come across a 1910 song, "My Rose of Alabama" by a prolific composer of the day, Alfred J. Lawrance. I have yet to find more information about this song. 

Taylor-Tot Baby Stroller

The first two photos below feature a happy baby--me--on a sidewalk in front of a house in Gadsden sometime in 1952 or 1953. I was born in March 1952, so these might have been taken that fall or even a warm Alabama winter day. 

I showed these photos to brother Richard recently, and he wondered about the "Taylor-Tot" name on the stroller. I thought, "Ha! There's a blog post in that...." So here we are.

The Francis F. Taylor Company was founded in the Cincinnati, Ohio, area in 1921, and seems to have been incorporated in that state in December 1924. The firm moved to Frankfurt, Kentucky, in 1964; I have so far been unable to determine what happened after that date. 

In addition to strollers, the company made tricycles, doll carriages, wagons and bicycles. A stroller patent was granted in 1931. The Smithsonian Museum of American History has a catalog and price list in its collection. Based on comments here, the stroller was apparently very popular. Several can be found for sale on eBay, Etsy, etc. 

And now we have evidence of an early 1950's sighting in Alabama.  

Here's another photo of a Taylor-Tot in the early 1950's.

Source: The Baby Stoller: A Visual History

The house mom and dad were renting in Gadsden when the above photos were taken looked like this in 2012. 

Once a Baptist Church, Now a Fabric Store

I worked at UAB from 1983 through 2015 and often left campus going down University Boulevard and then Green Springs Highway [Alabama State Highway 149] to enter I-65. Thus I passed this building, on the right just before the U.S. Army Reserve location, many, many times. Recently I decided to investigate.

The structure, obviously built as a church, has been home to King Cotton Fabrics since 1993. Janet and Bill Haas had opened The Cloth Patch in Tuscaloosa in 1968 and then expanded to this location. You can see interior photos here. There is also a Montgomery shop; the Tuscaloosa shop is no longer open. 

The structure has a Jefferson County Historical Commission sign noting the building's original use as Green Springs Baptist Church. I presume the two dates given are the congregation's organization and then construction of this building in 1905. The interior retains the original hardwood floors. A couple of other buildings are located on the property to the right in this photo, but I have no idea about their construction. 

Below the recent photos is a 1949 newspaper article about the church and the city's right of way on Green Springs Highway. Initially paved in the 1920's, Green Springs was partially rerouted and became a divided highway in the mid-1940's. The building has been changed very little since then. The article notes that the church had recently built a basement and would like to make an addition onto the back of the church. 

I have so far been unable to find any more information about the church. Two large histories of Baptists in Alabama, A. Hamilton Reid's Baptists in Alabama [1967] and Wayne Flynt's Alabama Baptists [1998] do not mention it.

Perhaps one day I'll stop by again and make some inquiries about further details. History just pops up all over the place, doesn't it? 

Source: Birmingham Public Library

Finding Alabama in Distant Places: A List

I'm continuing my efforts to bring related blog posts together in these lists, this time focusing on the ones I've done on this theme. These particular posts relate to actual places; a future list will include a different kind of "distance". 

So far I've also done posting lists for

"Holidays Past in Alabama" 

"Film Actresses from Alabama Before 1960"

"Medical History in Birmingham" 

"Alabama Library History".

Alabama Pizza Pasta in London, England, in 1998

Finding Alabama in Oklahoma

Finding Alabama in Oklahoma (2)

Finding Alabama in Oklahoma (3)

Finding Alabama in Oklahoma (4)

The Alabama Apartments in NYC in 1909

Finding Alabama in New York State

Vulcan Spotted in Lafayette, Louisiana

Strange Things Found in Alabama Stores (1)

Going through some photographs recently I came across a couple of examples of the random things I encounter here and there in stores and other public places. When I do I take photos. I've decided to share some of them in a series of posts on this blog.

These images may strike many as just silly, and some are, but I prefer to call them strange, weird, unexpected, something different springing out of the halls of American commerce. Or whatever. Let's begin. 

Feel free to tell us about your own strange finds in the comment section!

Well, obviously I didn't photograph this 1964 grocery store promotion from the Alabama Cattlemen's Association. I found it via Alabama Mosaic for one of my "Holidays Past in Alabama" postings on Father's Day. The ad just seems to set the right tone for this series. Beef, beef, beef! Oh, and Father's Day!

This little cutie made an appearance at the most recent Pelham Palooza last May. Blind in one eye, she is a permanent resident of the Alabama Wildlife Center located in Oak Mountain State Park. If you've never been to the AWC, it's well worth a trip--and your support. 

I turned a corner in a Pelham consignment shop and there it was. I did not check the price. 

This image is one of several delightful coffee signs decorating Kai's Koffee in Pelham, a place Dianne and I visit often. 

I found a pile of these on the book table at the Hoover Costco. I leave it to readers to unpack the multiple ironies. 

I spotted this delicacy at a Tuesday Morning store in Huntsville. I probably should have bought it even if the market for Elvis memorabilia is falling. 

Stories about medical people and places form a major genre in publishing just as they do on television. One subgenre is nursing stories and that includes titles like this one for younger girls in the Sue Barton series. This first title in the seven-book series was originally published in 1936. I found this paperback reprint in a Pelham consignment shop. 

Tune in next time boys and girls for another adventure in strange encounters!