During this holiday season please encourage your young friends and family members to explore their own heritage; not just the stuff about their parents-grandparents-great-grandparents but also the story of their town, their county, their region. Yesterday I studied five volumes which are CRYSTAL CLEAR WINDOWS into Dothan and Tuscaloosa's past: The 1935 Dothan City Directory, the 1939 Dothan City Directory, the 1902 Tuscaloosa City Directory, the 1916 Tuscaloosa City Directory and the 1924 Tuscaloosa City Directory. Because members of the Black race are noted in all five books, it is easy to find Black and White neighborhoods as well as Black-owned businesses along with Black schools and churches. For example, in 1935 Dothan had 7 Black-owned restaurants and 9 Black-owned grocery stores. I was also surprised to find that back then Dothan's Black high school was called South-East Alabama High School. I'll be sharing more of my discoveries but remember that these old city directories are one helluva research tool. If somebody was doing their job, all this stuff along with the old newspapers with THEIR LEGAL NOTICES would have all been online a long time ago as a PUBLIC SERVICE TO ALABAMA CITIZENS but, unfortunately, that ain't the case. (This 1902 Tuscaloosa City Directory does not have the typical street address log listing all the addresses, occupants, intersections, etc. This early directory is made up alphabetized lists of businesses and citizens with addresses under the new avenue and street grid. With today's technology, I believe that a 1902 Tuscaloosa street guide could be constructed using existing information.) https://archive.org/details/tuscaloosacitydi00unse/page/n6