Basil Allen

Basil Manly Allen (born December 20, 1859 in Carolina County, Virginia; died February 3, 1924 in Jefferson County) was a Birmingham judge and attorney.

Allen was the son of Reverend Littlebury Woodson Allen and the former Harriett Ann Martin of Virginia. The family was residing in Louisville, Kentucky when the Civil War began, at which time Reverend Woodson resigned from the pulpit and returned to Virginia to raise an infantry regiment. He served throughout the conflict and was present at Appomattox Courthouse when Lee surrendered. Harriet died in 1865 and Basil was raised and educated by his older sister, Hattie.

Allen graduated at the top of his class at the Agricultural College of Virginia in 1877 and began reading law under E. C. Moncure in Virginia. In 1878 he moved to Hale County and continued his studies under Thomas Roulhac in Greensboro. He was admitted to the bar in Hale County in 1880 and opened his own practice in 1881. He was elected to the Commissioners' Court and to the office of Justice of the Peace that same year, and also raised livestock at a large plantation in the area. In January 1882 he moved to Birmingham, where he was appointed Justice of the Peace in March, and elected for a full term in 1884.

Allen founded the Birmingham Lodge No. 79 of the Benevolent Protective Order of Elks in 1879, and was elected Grand Exalted Leader of the order in 1899. He was also a leader in the Phoenix Lodge No. 25 of the Knights of Pythias, and a member of the International Order of Foresters and Improved Order of Red Men. He reigned as Rex Vulcan II during Birmingham's 1897 Mardi-Gras festivities.

Allen married the former Carolyn Dyer and had two children, Walter and Peter. Sometime after 1913 the family moved from a home at 1008 20th Street South to the former T. G. Bush residence at 2228 Highland Avenue.

Allen kept offices in the Kessler Building at 1924–1926 3rd Avenue North, and also owned property a block east, where the Majestic Theatre was built in 1906. On October 8, 1918, Allen appeared before the health committee established by the Birmingham City Commission, representing the management of the Lyric Theatre. Allen urged the commission not to take the "hasty action" of passing a shutdown ordinance during the 1918 influenza pandemic. The Lyric was well ventilated, he argued, and doing "war work" by showing newsreels and honoring the government's wishes that, "the people be kept amused."

Allen died in 1924 and is buried at Elmwood Cemetery, where his monument takes the form of a curved pentastyle Doric colonnade and entablature.

References

• Owen, Thomas McAdory and Marie Bankhead Owen (1921) History of Alabama and Dictionary of Alabama Biography. 4 volumes. Chicago, Illinois: S. J. Clarke Publishing Co.

External links

• Basil Manly Allen at Findagrave.com