1888

1888 was the 17th year after the founding of the City of Birmingham.

Events

• B. A. Thompson succeeded Judge A. O. Lane as Mayor of Birmingham.
• Benjamin Franklin Riley accepted the presidency of Howard College.
• Bethel A.M.E. Church was founded in Rosedale.
• The city of Bessemer was incorporated.
• March 14: Rufus N. Rhodes published the first edition of the Birmingham Evening News.
• Summer: Giuseppe Moretti first moved to the United States, arriving in New York.
• September 1: Joseph Smith succeeded Samuel Truss as Jefferson County sheriff.
• October 31: South Highland Presbyterian Church was organized
• November: President Grover Cleveland visited Birmingham.
• November 8: The Daily Birmingham Age and Daily Herald merged to form the Birmingham Age-Herald.
• December 4: The body of May Hawes was found floating in East Lake by two boaters.

Buildings

• First Watts Building (demolished 1927)
• Thomas Furnace and Bessemer Furnaces go into blast.
• Bessemer Block

Deaths

• July 19: Liza Montgomery, 19, the first person to be buried in Red Mountain Cemetery.
• December 1: Emma Hawes, May Hawes, Irene Hawes

Context

1888 was a leap year. It was the year of the invention of the ball-point pen and typewriter ribbon and the founding of the National Geographic Society. Jack the Ripper terrorized London. A March blizzard was blamed for more than 400 deaths on the Atlantic seaboard. The Washington Monument opened in October and Benjamin Harrison took the electoral college to defeat popular vote leader Grover Cleveland in the presidential election.

1880s

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