Also see Specific Destinations, Travel and Location Humor.

Page Toppers

• Alabama Bound
• Alabama Getaway
• Alabama Highway
• Alabama Nights
• Alabama Rain
• Alabama Saturday Night
• Alabama Sky
• Alabama Summertime
• Alabama Sun
• Alabama's the Place to Be
• Always Alabama
• Automobile Trip Through Alabama
• Birmingham Sunday
• Breakfast in Birmingham
• Heart of Dixie
• I'm Going Back to Alabama
• Midnight in Montgomery
• Montgomery in the Rain
• My Heart's in Alabama
• Stars Fell on Alabama Last Night
• Sunny Alabama

Quotes

• Alabama citizens, like the vast majority of Americans, respect and value the meaning of decency, and appreciate public institutions that reflect the common values of our society. (Mike Rogers)
• Like most Alabama towns, Greenville has broad oak-lined streets and many stately homes whose deep shady lawns are studded with magnolias, japonicas, and other plants in keeping with their old-fashioned elegance. (WPA Guide to Alabama)
• Mobile stays in the heart, loveliest of cities. (Carl Carmer)
• When I get to be a composer I'm gonna write me some music about Daybreak in Alabama. (Langston Hughes)

Alabama Symbols

• Nicknames: The Yellowhammer State; The Cotton State; The Heart of Dixie; The Lizard state
• Slogan: Unforgettable Alabama
• Motto: We dare defend our rights
• Mascot: Eastern Tiger Swallowtail
• Poet Laureate: Sue Brannan Walker
• Former Song: Alabama(words by Julia S. Tutwiler, music by Edna G. Gussen)
• Song: Stars Fell on Alabama
• Folk Dance: Square Dance
• Colors: Red and White
• Quilt: Pine Burr Quilt
• Horse: Racking Horse
• Bird: Yellowhammer
• Game Bird: Wild Turkey
• Freshwater Fish: Largemouth Bass
• Salt Water Fish: Tarpon
• Amphibian: Red Hills Salamander
• Reptile: Red-Bellied Turtle
• Insect: Monarch Butterfly
• Butterfly: Eastern Tiger Swallowtail
• Tree: Southern Longleaf Pine
• Nut: Pecan
• Fruit: Blackberry
• Tree Fruit: Peach
• Flower: Camellia
• Wildflower: Oak-leaf Hydrangea
• Shell: Johnstone's Junonia
• Fossil: Zeuglodon(Basilosaurus cetoides)
• Gemstone: Star Blue Quartz
• Mineral: Red Iron Ore (Hematite)
• Rock: Marble

Facts About Alabama

• Capital: Montgomery
• Residents: Alabamans, Alabamians
• State Name Origin: The state was named after the Alabama River. Both Choctaw and Creek words are cited as the origin of the river's name.
• Admitted to Statehood: 14 Dec 1819
• Order of Admission: 22nd state
• Coastline/Shoreline: 53/607 miles
• Length: 330 miles
• Width: 190 miles
• Area: 52,419 square miles
• Size Rank: 30
• Number of Counties: 67
• Standing Water: over 500,000 acres
• Streams and Rivers: 77,274 miles
• Geographic Center: 12 miles SW of Clanton in Chilton Co.
• Mean Elevation: 500 feet
• Highest Point: Cheaha Mountain (in the Talladega National Forest), 2,407 feet
• Lowest Point: Gulf of Mexico, sea level
• Agricultural Products: livestock, cotton, peanuts (half of all peanuts produced in the U.S. are grown within 100 miles of Dothan)
• Commercial Products: paper, chemical, rubber, plastics, textiles, transportation equipment, lumber, coal, oil, natural gas, cast iron and steel pipe
• Average Annual Rainfall: 56.9 inches
• Average Winter High Temperature: around 45 degrees
• Record Low Temperature: -27 degrees (30 Jan 1966 New Market)
• Average Summer High Temperature: near 80 degrees
• Record High Temperature: 112 degrees (5 Sep 1925 Centerville)
• Official Language: English
• More information about Alabama

from Stars Fell on Alabama

(Mitchell Parish, Frank Perkins 1934)

Moonlight and magnolias, starlight in your hair
All the world a dream come true
Did it really happen, was I really there
Was I really there with you

We lived our little drama, we kissed in a field of white
And stars fell on Alabama that night
I can't forget the glamor, your eyes held a tender light
And stars fell on Alabama last night

Chorus:
I never planned in my imagination, a situation so heavenly
A fairy land that no one else could enter
And in the center, just you and me, dear
My heart beat like a hammer, my arms wound around you tight
And stars fell on Alabama last night

Items of Interest

• The Women's Army Corp Museum at Fort McClellan, in Anniston, is the only museum in the world dedicated to women in the military.
• Alabama workers built the first rocket to put humans on the moon.
• The world's first Electric Trolley System was introduced in Montgomery in 1886.
• Alabama is the only state with all major natural resources needed to make iron and steel.
• Montgomery was the capital of the Confederate States of America. The Confederate flag was designed and first flown in Alabama in 1861.
• The Boll Weevil Monument in Enterprise acknowledges the role this destructive insect played in encouraging farmers to grow crops other than cotton. This was the first statue ever erected in honor of an insect pest.
• The Birmingham Airport opened in 1931. At that time a Birmingham to Los Angeles flight took nineteen hours.
• On August 5, 1864, at the Battle of Mobile Bay Admiral David Farragut issued his famous command, "Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead."

Notable Natives

Some of these were born here, others just lived a while in the state.

• Robert Abernathy - civil rights activist (Linden)
• Evan Frank Allison - conservationist
• Henry Louis "Hank" Aaron (1934- ) - baseball player with home run and rbi records (Mobile)
• Tallulah Brockman Bankhead (1902-1968) - star of stage, screen, and radio (Huntsville)
• Hugo LaFayette Black - supreme court justice (Harlan)
• Robert Bullard - soldier
• George Washington Carver (1864-1943) - educator, agricultural chemist
• Nathaniel Adams "Nat King" Cole (1917-1965) - pianist and singer (Montgomery)
• Jerome Cochrane - public health officer
• Marva Collins - educator (Monroeville)
• Samuel Dale - pioneer
• Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald - writer (Montgomery)
• Bobby Goldsboro - singer (Dothan)
• Lionel Hampton - jazz musician (Birmingham)
• William Christopher Handy - composer, musician (Florence)
• Emmy Lou Harris - singer (Birmingham)
• Kate Jackson - actress (Birmingham)
• Mae Jemison (1956- ) - astronaut, first African-American woman in space (Decatur)
• Percy Lavon Julian - inventor (Montgomery)
• Helen Adams Keller (1880-1968) - blind and deaf author, educator (Tuscumbia)
• Coretta Scott King - civil rights leader, wife of Martin Luther King, Jr. (Marion)
• Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968) minister, civil rights leader (Montgomery)
• Harper Lee (1926- )- Pulitzer Prize-winning author for To Kill a Mockingbird (Monroeville)
• Carl Lewis (1961- ) - Olympic Gold medalist in track (Birmingham)
• Joe Louis (1914-1981) - boxer (Lexington)
• Willie Howard Mays (1931- ) - baseball player (Westfield)
• Alexander McGillivray - Indian leader
• Jim Nabors - actor (Sylacauga)
• James Cleveland "Jesse" Owens (1913-1980) - Olympic track and field athlete, four gold medals in 1936 (Danville)
• Rosa Parks (1913- ) - civil rights leader who refused to give up her bus seat to a white man (Tuskegee)
• Daniel Pratt - industrialist
• Jimmie Rodgers - singer (Geiger)
• David Satcher - surgeon general (Anniston)
• Sequoya (1770-1843) - devised a phonetic, written alphabet of the Cherokee language, which was the first alphabet of any native American language
• Tuscaloosa - Choctaw leader
• George Wallace - governor, presidential candidate (Clio)
• William Weatherford (Red Eagle) - Creek leader
• Heather Whitestone (1973- ) - in 1995 she was the first Miss America chosen with a disability (Dothan)
• Hiram "Hank" Williams (1923-1953) - country music singer (Georgiana)
• Augusta Evans Wilson - author

The Alabama State Flag
The Alabama flag, reminiscent of the Confederate battle flag, was adopted in 1895. The background of the flag is white. A crimson St. Andrew's cross formed of bars no less than six inches wide extend diagonally all the way across the flag. The flag is made both in a square and in a rectangle. The St. Andrews cross is a Christian symbol that represents truth, honor, courage, and defiance against tyranny.

You know you are from Alabama if...

• You measure distance in hours.
• You've ever had to switch from "heat" to "A/C" in the same day.
• Stores don't have bags; they have sacks.
• Stores don't have shopping carts; they have buggies.
• You see a car running in the parking lot at the store with no one in it, no matter what time of the year.
• You use "fix" as a verb. Example: I am fixing to go to the store.
• All the festivals across the state are named after a fruit, vegetable, grain, or animal.
• You install security lights on your house and garage and leave both unlocked.
• You carry jumper cables in your car...for your OWN car.
• You know what "cow tipping" and "snipe hunting" are.
• You only own four spices: salt, pepper, ketchup, and Tabasco.
• You think everyone from a bigger city has an accent.
• You think sexy lingerie is a tee shirt and boxer shorts.
• The local paper covers national and international news on one page but requires six pages for sports.
• You think that the first day of deer season is a national holiday.
• You know which leaves make good toilet paper.
• You find 90 degrees F "a little warm."
• You know all four seasons: Almost Summer, Summer, Still Summer, and Christmas.
• You know whether another Alabamian is from southern or northern Alabama as soon as they open their mouth.
• There is a Dairy Queen in every town with a population of 1000 or more.
• Going to Wal-Mart is a favorite past-time known as "goin wal-martin" or off to "Wally World.
• You describe the first cool snap (below 70 degrees) as good chili weather.
• A carbonated soft drink isn't a soda, cola, or pop...it's a Coke, regardless of brand or flavor
• You understand these jokes and forward them to your friends from Alabama.

Songs about Alabama

• Alabama - Cross Canadian Ragweed (2005)
• Alabama Bound - Merle and Doc Watson (1971)
• Alabama Clay - Seldom Scene (1987)
• Alabama Gal - Pete and Mike Seeger and Larry Eisenberg (1959)
• Alabama Getaway - The Grateful Dead (1980)
• Alabama Highway - Steve Young (1975)
• Alabama Jubilee - Michael Aumen (1989)
• Alabama Nights - The Crawlers (1992)
• Alabama Rain - Jim Croce (1973)
• Alabama Rose - Faron Young (1970)
• Alabama Saturday Night - Wilf Carter (1952)
• Alabama Sky - Alabama (1983)
• Alabama Smile - Court Pickett (1973)
• Alabama Song - Allison Moorer (1998)
• Alabama State of Mind - Claire Lynch (1994)
• Alabama Summertime - James Talley (1977)
• Alabama Sun - Becky Schlegel (2002)
• Alabama Woman - Red Steagall (1970)
• Alabama's the Place to Be - Little Jimmy Reed (1996)
• Automobile Trip Through Alabama - The New Lost City Ramblers (1965)
• Dreamy Alabama - Atlanta Rhythm Section (1999)
• Flowers from the Fields of Alabama - Norman Blake (2001)
• He Came From Alabama - Lawrence Reynolds (2003)
• I'm Going Back to Alabama - Guy Mitchell (1967)
• Leavin' Alabama - Diane Craig (2002)
• My Home's in Alabama - Alabama (1980)
• North Alabama - Dave Kirby (1981)
• Rose of Alabama, The - Craig Smith (1997)
• Stars Fell on Alabama (Last Night) - Jimmy Buffett (1992)
• Sweet Home Alabama - Charlie Daniels Band (1981)

Songs about Alabama Cities

• Leaving Loachapoka - Marshall Chapman (1996)
• Mobile, Alabama - Curtis Gordon (1956)
• Angel From Montgomery - Rosey Nix Adams (1997)
• Midnight in Montgomery - Alan Jackson (1992)
• Mobile, Alabama - Curtis Gordon (1956)
• Montgomery in the Rain - Steve Young (1972)
• Velma from Selma - Augie Meyers (2001)

Songs about Birmingham

• Any Bar in Birmingham - Don Rigsby (2006)
• Birmingham - Randy Newman (1974)
• Birmingham Blues - Jack Barlow (1969)
• Birmingham Bounce - The Pebbles (1950)
• Birmingham Jail - Lead Belly (1948)
• Birmingham Steel - Frazier River (1996)
• Birmingham Sunday - Joan Baez (1964)
• Birmingham Turnaround - Rhonda Vincent (1991)
• Boulder to Birmingham - Emmylou Harris and Mark Knopfler (2006)
• Breakfast in Birmingham - David Lee Murphy (1996)
• Bus Back to Birmingham, A - Rusty McHugh and Mike Fincher (2001)
• Fifteen Miles from Birmingham - Josh Graves (1978)
• Hello L.A., Bye Bye Birmingham - Larry Henley (1969)
• Postmarked Birmingham - Blackhawk (1997)
• Sharon, Stay in Birmingham - Columbus Jones (1969)
• Walkin' Back to Birmingham - Leon Ashley (1969)