Aldridge Garden Shop

The Aldridge Garden Shop & Nursery was a retail and wholesale plant supplier located at 2109 Montgomery Highway (now Richard Arrington Jr Boulevard South) in Birmingham's Redmont Park neighborhood from 1954 to 2002.

The business was founded by Loren Aldridge in 1927 and he was joined by his son, Eddie. The business operated from greenhouses in Bessemer before opening the shop near Vulcan Park.

In 1969 Eddie and Loren Aldridge successfully propagated a cutting from an unusual white hydrangea that had been growing at a home in Lipscomb from a specimen originally found at Turkey Creek near Pinson in 1923. The Aldridges patented the plant as the "Snowflake hydrangea" in 1971. The plant was publicized and sold worldwide, and Eddie and his wife, Kay planted hundreds of the hydrangeas at their home in Hoover.

In 1982 Aldridge leased the nursery shop to John Fort. They decided to sell the property in 2000. Negotiations for the sale continued for more than a year, partly because Fort and Aldridge wished to stipulate a higher use for the property than the drug store that was proposed by the potential buyer. Nevertheless, after the sale closed in August 2002, a Walgreen's was built on the site.

References

• Nobles, Barr (June 30, 2002) "Aldridge Garden Shop making final harvest." Birmingham Business Journal
• Milliken, Christy (September/October 2015) "Summertime Snowflakes" VIE magazine