Clarke County Democrat

Editor’s Notes

A visit to The Shoals

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People like to travel and many tour far-flung states or even travel out of the country.

Alabama is a big state and there are parts of it many folks never see. Take “The Shoals” area of northwest Alabama, for instance. Florence, on the Tennessee River, is the largest and the metro area also includes Muscle Shoals, Sheffield and Tuscumbia. The cities are the economic hub for the region.

I attended the annual meeting of the Alabama Historical Association in Florence over the weekend. A lot of good history presentations were made and we also got to tour some local historical sites. The Belle Mont planation home south of Tuscumbia is a gem. Built in 1828, it is of an unusual (for Alabama) Palladian style, favored by Thomas Jefferson. No one knows who built the house but it has a lot of Jefferson-inspired features which leads to speculation it was built by craftsmen who may have worked on Jefferson creations.

Moving forward to the 20th century, Florence is home to the only Frank Lloyd Wrightdesigned home in the state, the Rosenbaum House. It was built in 1939-40. Wright was a famous architect known for a modernistic style and this house certainly is that!

Those of us who grew up listening to the music of the 1970s know the reputation of The Shoals area for its music studios where many of the famous musicians and groups of that era recorded — the Rolling Stones, the Allman Brothers, Rod Stewart, Bob Dylan, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Paul Simon and so many more. We toured the 3614 Jackson Highway studio in Sheffield. It has been restored and is now a museum but occasionally still used to record music.

It was a treat standing in that studio and listening to the songs of my teens and 20s that were recorded there.

All of this was good and interesting but a landmark I wanted to see that wasn’t on our tour was the burial place of the namesake of my hometown, Coffeeville.

John Coffee was a veteran of the War of 1812 and the Creek Indian War. He was a friend of Andrew Jackson and fought with him at New Orleans and Horseshoe Bend. He retired a brigadier general. He was an early settler of Florence and in 1818 purchased more than 1,200 acres and established a plantation that he named “Hickory Hill.”

Coffee never visited Coffeeville, Ala. (or, I suspect, Coffeeville, Miss. or the Coffee counties in Alabama, Tennessee and Kentucky named for him). Thomas Figures owned a lot of property in Coffeeville and had been a major in the War of 1812 and served with Coffee. I think they were friends but if not Figures likely thought enough of his commanding officer to suggest naming the community for him. This would have been about 1819.

The Tombigbee River town had been Murrell’s Landing, named for William Murrell who established a ferry there about 1808 and was a state legislator in 1819-1820.

Figures’ son, John, by the way, built what would be known as the York Home, an antebellum home that stood in the center of Coffeeville for more than 120 years.

The Coffee Cemetery is next to a recentlybuilt Walmart Supercenter. There was more than a little controversy over building the store because of the closeness of the cemetery and an adjacent cemetery of African Americans who were Coffee slaves. But it was built.

The cemetery has a tall brick wall around it. There is no gate or exterior steps so this fat boy pulled himself up and over the wall to get a better view of the graves. Thankfully, there are interior steps so getting out was easier.

John Coffee’s gravestone is the tallest in the cemetery. You can barely read the inscription on it or on most of the other stones.

Finding that cemetery was one of the best parts of the trip.

I’d recommend a visit to The Shoals area. There’s plenty to see and do!

Jim Cox is editor and publisher of The Clarke County Democrat.

Email: jimcox@tds.net.

Jim Cox

Jim Cox

The Coffee Cemetery in Florence. John Coffee’s grave is the tall marker to the left of center. The wall is taller than it looks — about five feet. The editor had to crawl over it!

The Coffee Cemetery in Florence. John Coffee’s grave is the tall marker to the left of center. The wall is taller than it looks — about five feet. The editor had to crawl over it!

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