Jefferson County, Alabama Biographies

Jefferson County, Alabama Biographies

The following biographies were extracted from: Jefferson County and Birmnigham, Alabama: Historical and Biographical, 1887, Author: John Witherspoon Dubose.

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JOHN W. READ, President of the Birmingham National Bank, and a fine representative of the pluck and energy of the "New South," is a native of Alabama, born in Huntsville in 1857. His parents, Wm. T. and Jane (Wheeden) Head, were also natives of this State, and of Scotch-Irish extraction.

Prior to the war his father was extensively engaged in planting and merchandising, but subsequently moved to New Orleans, where he was engaged in the cotton trade until his death, in 1885. The mother of our subject resides with him in Birmingham.

John W. is third of a family of eight children, and was well educated in the schools of New Orleans . When a youth he entered the New Orleans National Bank as office boy, and won his way, by natural business qualifications and steady determination, through every position in the bank, until, in April, 1884, he was appointed cashier of the Alabama State Bank, now the Alabama National, and one of the most successful in the State. Its prosperity is due, in a great measure, to the enterprise and progressive tendencies of its officers, who are vitally interested in many of the great corporations-that are laying a solid foundation for the future great city to rest upon. Mr. Read continued with this institution until February, 1887, when he resigned his position and organized the Birmingham National Bank, which commenced business in April, 1887, with a capital stock of $250,000. Mr. Read was elected president, and H. C. Ansley - cashier. With an experience from his youth in banking, and possessing the rare attributes necessary for large commercial and business transactions, President Read will doubtless pilot the Birmingham National to the front ranks of the banks of Alabama, He will be ably assisted by the following board of directors, all young and progressive business men of Birmingham: B. C. Scott, Jos. Slaton, Sam'l Ullman, John W. Tomlinson, J. H. McCary, E. Solomon, D. M. Drennen, E. C. Mackey, Ashbury Thompson, J. L. Watkins, R. J. Terry, and John W. Read.

Mr. Read has also made fortunate investments in real estate upon his personal account, and is largely interested in various corporations and industrial enterprises. In association with John W. Tomlinson he is erecting a handsome and commodious business block on First avenue.

Mr. Read was united in marriage with Miss Adele Urban, of St. Louis , in April,. 1883. They have one child, Elmore.

CARLOS H. REESE was born May 4, 1847 at Eutaw, the county seat of Greene, one of the wealthiest of the agricultural counties ofAlabama. He is the son of E. and Charlotte M. Reese, nee McKinstry, the father a native of South Carolina and the mother of Connecticut. The father was a carriage builder. While at school in his fifteenth year, Carlos H. enlisted in Captain Relan's company of artillery, Confederate States Army. He remained in the service until the close of the-war. Returning to Eutaw he engaged with his father in the latter's trade. He afterward set up in Demopolis on his own account. Next he bought land in Pickens County and became a farmer. In four years he gave up this, sold his farm, and returned to his-trade in Corinth, Miss.

June, 1882, Mr. Reese came to Birmingham, and began work at his trade on a small scale. He now employs eight hands, and his business is increasing and assuming large proportions.

September 24, 1870, Mr, Reese married Miss Mary Clinton, daughter of James Clinton, of Pickens County. They have two children—Fannie C. and Lottie M. Mr. and Mrs. Reese are members of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, and he is superintendent of the Sunday school of that church at Avondale.

CHARLES ROBERTS of Roberts & Son publishers, is a son of Willis and Mary ( Harvey ) Roberts. A sketch of the former appears in another portion of this work.

Our subject was born in Wetumpka, Alabama , June 21,1856, and at an early age entered the printing office of his father, and possessing a natural taste for the business he applied himself so energetically that in a few years he was thoroughly conversant with the “Art Preservative" in all its various departments.

There is no better school for youth to acquire a liberal and practical education than a large printing office where all classes of work are published, and Mr. Roberts has worked himself up from the bottom round of the ladder to become the manager of one of the largest and best equipped establishments in the State.

He came to Birmingham in 1875 to assist his father, who had established his business there in 1872, through his partner, Mr. Frank A. Duval, a skillful printer of long experience, who commenced the business with a quarto Gordon press and a small assortment of type, establishing the first job office in the city, in a small frame building on the south side of the alley between Third and Fourth avenues, on Twentieth street.

Mr. Duval, besides being a thorough master of his trade was also a fine business man, and, upon opening the office, adopted for a motto: "We have come to stay," and the present large establishment of Roberts & Son, on First Avenue, the outgrowth of that small beginning, illustrates how applicable was the motto.

They now have two of the most improved large cylinder presses, three jobbers, and a large stock of type and machinery of all kinds necessary to successfully conduct their extensive business, which is not confined to the city, but extends over a considerable portion of the State. They also do a large amount of work for corporations and county offices, competing successfully with the prices from the larger cities.

Our subject is a young man of business qualifications of merit, and conducts the management of the large interest entrusted to him in a thorough business manner, which under his supervision will continue to flourish and advance with the rapid growth of this favored region.

Mr. Roberts was married in April, 1881, to Miss Florence, daughter of C. H. and Hattie (Earl) Perkins, of Tuscaloosa, Alabama . Three children have been born to them—Charles, Tod H., and Louisa. Mr. and Mrs. Roberts are members of the Episcopal Church.

B. F. RODEN was born in DeKalb County, Alabama, in 1844, and is a son of W. B. and Viola Harrison Roden, who were natives of Tennessee, but came with their parents to what is now Alabama before it was organized as a State.

His grandfather, Joseph D. Harrison, was a representative of the first legislature of the State, and his grandfather, John B. Roden, the first tax collector of Blount County , in which both men first located. The father died in 1876, at the advanced age of ninety-one.

The parents of our subject were married in Blount County , and followed agricultural pursuits.

B. F. Roden was reared upon a farm, and received the early education that the schools of that period afforded. He was among the first to enter the Confederate service in 1861, and continued during the entire war period.

He first became a member of Company G-, Twenty-seventh Alabama Infantry, which. was subsequently formed into the Thirty-first, and soon after consolidated and made the Forty-ninth Infantry, serving in Polk's army, Breckinridge's Kentucky Brigade and Division. At the battle of Shiloh he was severely wounded by a musket ball, which shattered the knee joint, which forced him to resign from active service, and he was-assigned to the commissary department, where he remained until the close of the war. After the close of hostilities Mr. Roden migrated to Texas, and for over two years attended McKenzie's College, and subsequently, for two years, was a teacher in the Choc-taw Nation, Indian Territory.

Returning to Alabama he entered the mercantile trade at Gadsden , under the firm name of Latham & Roden, where he remained four years.

In 1871 Mr. Roden came to Birmingham , where he has been engaged in active business ever since, and has assisted, to a large extent, in building up the business portion of the town, and also various public corporations and enterprises. One of the finest, business blocks in the city bears his name. It is on the corner of Second Avenue and Twentieth Street , is three stories high, built of pressed brick, and handsomely trimmed with stone. The lower floor is occupied by Mr. Roden as a grocery, and the Birmingham National Bank. The second floor is occupied by offices, and the third floor as bedrooms.

Mr. Roden devotes his time chiefly to the various corporations with which he is. connected. He is the founder and president of the Avondale Land Company; is one of the founders of the Birmingham Gas and Electric Light Company, of which he is vice-president, general manager and treasurer; is one of the founders of the Birmingham Chain Works, and is president of the Birmingham Insurance Company. He is also one of the directors of the Alabama National Bank, and a large investor in real estate.

Mr. Roden served as alderman during the first ten trying years of the history of Birmingham, and was the founder and president of the first street railroad.

In 1872 he married Miss Ella Didlake, of Perry County, Alabama. They have five-children—Viola H., Florence L., Lillian, Mabelle, and Benjamin F., Jr.

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