Butler County, Alabama - Chapter 10, 1885

We will now take the reader over a summary of all the resources of thb county, showing him its area of cultivated and uncultivated lands, the variety of soil in different localities, with its products ; and, in fact, everything of interest to a person in search of general information will be found in this chapter. A fuller description of the small

There are in this county about 450,000 acres of land, about 5,200 of which belongs to the Government, subject to homestead entry at the rate of ten cents per acre; the rest is owned by corporations and private individuals. The Mobile and Montgomery Railroad, which extends about thirty-four miles nearly diagonally across the county, owns 8,800 acres, valued at ^1.25 per acre; the Michigan Land Company owns 10,700 acres, the Milner, Caldwell & Flowers Mill corporation owns 25,000 acres, and Judge Samuel Boiling pays taxes on 20,000 acres. Joseph Steiner, W. W. Wilkinson, and others, own small plantations in several portions of the county.

The mineral resources of the county are limited. Up to the present there has been reported but one deposit of iron ore which contains enough metallic iron to pay for working it.

The real value of the land, as well as its market price, depends upon the amount of timber on it, its agricultural products, and its locality. All the land of the county can be classified under three heads, viz., the Prairie, or Black Belt; the Middle, or Red Clay Belt; and the Southern, or Gray Lands.

Black Belt. The land in the northwestern part of the county, drained by Cedar Creek and the lower half of Wolf Creek, and lying north of Man- ningham, and north of Monterey, and bordering these villages on the north, is of the black prairie variety, and is very productive without any assistance in the way of fertilizers. There are about 8,500 acres of this land, nearly all of which is in a high state of cultivation. The principal growth on these lands was red cedar, ash, hickory, several kinds of oak, covered with gray moss, poplar, wahoo, elm, sweet gum, dogwood, etc. Cane also grows vigorously in this region. This soil yields from thirty-five to sixty bushels of corn, from 800 to 1,700 pounds of seed cotton per acre, and other things in proportion. From the richness of the soil, this is the most valuable farming land in the county, selling for, at least, $\o, and sometimes as high as $25, per acre. Fossils and rocks of the cretaceous division are plentiful here, and interfere somewhat with the higher cultivation of the soil. Water in this section is very scarce, and, when found, is impregnated with lime, which renders it almost unfit for drinking purposes, often producing sickness. The malaria, constantly rising from the stagnant water in the lagoons found on the edges of the swamps, is the cause of so much sickness, that but few people dare trust their health in this locality. A great many, nevertheless, live along the dividing line between the red and the black land, and own plantations in this productive region.

extends in a southern direction, occupying nearly all of that portion of the county lying north of Greenville, and including that city, and extending east to Crenshaw County. The red color of this soil is due to the large amount of iron oxide diffused through it. In some places this iron has been concentrated, probably by the agency of circulating atmospheric water charged with organic matter, and may now be found in beds of very fair needle iron ore, yielding about fifty per cent, of metallic iron upon analysis. This deposit of ore begins in the neighborhood of Dead Fall, and is found on the tops of hills from this place around to near McBride's, in the eastern part of the county. The red clay section is not near so productive as the prairie lands, but when properly assisted by some kind of fertilizer, it has been known to produce very abundantly. Naturally, it yields from six to eight hundred pounds of seed cotton, and from fifteen to twenty bushels of corn per acre, but can be made to produce three or four times as much if properly assisted and cultivated. The natural growth is chestnut, oak, hickory, gum, long and short-leaf pine, etc. This land is generally termed rolling, and is supplied with plenty of freestone water. The locality is healthful and convenient to market. The larger portion of this division is already under cultivation, and is valued at from ;^5 to $\^ per acre. Gray, or Sandy Loam Belt. The third, or gray belt, embraces all the land covered with yellow pine timber as the principal growth, and includes the most of the land lying in the middle and southern part of the county. This soil, which is of a gray, sandy variety, is very productive when properly assisted by fertilization, and can not be cultivated to any advantage if some help is not received in the way of manure, bone phosphate, or some kind of decayed organic matter. The land is very valuable for its pure freestone water, its healthfulness of locality, and its immense forests of long-leaf pine, which are now being utilized by having the timber sawed into lumber and shipping it in large quantities to the Western States, where it finds a ready market. This land, having plenty of timber, an abundance of good water, being level and susceptible of the highest stages of cultivation, will soon be the most valuable land in the county. Those desiring a safe investment would do well to purchase a few hundred acres of this land while it is comparatively cheap, the price now being from 50 cents to ;^io an acre, and if the development in this region continues, the value will increase to four and five times what it now is. The land at Forest Home, in the western part of the county, is of this variety, and has been developed in a remarkable manner within the last ten years. In 1870 the best land could be bought for $^ per acre ; none can be bought now for less than $2^ per acre. All of our gray lands are becoming more and more in demand every day. They promise to be the garden spot of the South for truck farming. This has been thoroughly demonstrated by experiments in the growth of all kinds of vegetables known to grow in this climate. All kinds of grapes and fruit trees can be as profitably cultivated here as the vegetables. All of the agricultural and horticultural properties of this soil have been thoroughly tested by skilled farmers living in different localities of the county.

Cotton is Butler's principal product, yielding 15,000 bales as the average crop. All of the land is well adapted to the growth of corn, cotton, oats, sweet and Irish potatoes, sugar cane, all kinds of garden plants and fruits of nearly every variety known. The author is of the opinion that it would be far better for the farmers to have a diversity of agricultural products than to depend upon cotton as the only source of revenue or pay. This plan is practicable in many respects. In the first place, the cotton crop often turns out a faik ure; in this case other products would help out; another good reason is, it would make the farmers more independent; they could live more at home, live better, and become more prosperous. There are 108,480 acres of tilled land in the county, planted as follows: cotton, 41,320; corn, 21,570; oats, 15,350; sweet potatoes, 860; these being the principal products.

Greenville, Butler's seat of justice, is located a little north of the center of the county, on the Mobile and Montgomery Division of the Louisville and Nashville Railroad, forty-five miles south of Montgomery, the Capital of the State. This is our largest town, and is an incorporated city of about 4,000 inhabitants. There are five commodious churches and several fine schools at this place. The Greenville Collegiate Institute is under the control of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and the South Alabama Female Institute under the supervision of the Baptist denomination. Besides these, there are several private schools - the Greenville Male High School, the Butler High School, and others, all of them having the services of competent and experienced teachers, who giv.e instruction in the different departments of science and literature.

The court-house is beautifully located in the eastern part of the town, and is a very durable building, constructed of the best quality of pressed brick. The Greenville Advocate, the only paper now published in the county, is printed here every Wednesday, with Colonel J. B. Stanley as editor and proprietor.

Georgiana, fourteen miles south of Greenville, is a flourishing little town of 800 souls, and ranks next to Greenville in importance in the county. Garland is about twenty miles below Greenville; population, 300. Both of these towns are on the railroad. Forest Home, a village fifteen miles west of Greenville, is located in a beautiful and productive part of the county. Manningham and Monterey, villages situated on the southern bor-

The people enjoy a very good system of public schools established in every township, the salaries of the teachers being paid by an appropriation annually made by the State for that purpose. The private schools are generally very good, but are not what they should be. The people are not as much aroused upon the subject of education as their interests demand, and it is sincerely hoped that they will soon arouse themselves from their apparent lethargy, in order that they may be in harmony with the efforts now being made by the State to advance the cause of education and to extend its enlightening influence to the masses of the people.

We have no rivers in Butler, though the county is well supplied with water. The most of the streams furnish sufficient water-power to run any kind of machinery, when properly applied. Waterpower is now extensively used throughout the county for grinding corn and ginning cotton. Pigeon and Persimmon are our longest and largest creeks, and are both used to some extent for rafting pine and cypress timber to Pensacola, Florida, for ship-building purposes.

There are several large steam-power saw-mills situated on the Louisville and Nashville Railroad, which are doing a very successful business in converting our pine forests into very fine lumber.

Within the borders of the county are found seventy-six churches, most of which are Methodist and Baptist. None of these churches have preaching every Sunday except those in Greenville, but they all have services, at least, once -each month during the year. This exerts a wonderful influence upon the people throughout the county, and assists very materially in molding their character and in making of them good and useful citizens. Churches, wherever found, are a good sign of an enlightened and prosperous people.

Butler County is known throughout the State for her many accommodations, for her refined society, and for the general intelligence of her citizens. No portion of Alabama is more desirable for homes and agricultural purposes than portions of this county, and few people are so happy and contented as her people.