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.
RUFUS NAPOLEON RHODES, journalist,
was born June 5, 1856, at Pascagoula, Jackson County, Miss., and died
January 12, 1910, at Birmingham; son of Rufus Randolph and Martha
(Fisher) Rhodes, the former who was for many years a prominent lawyer
practicing at Washington, D. C., and at New Orleans, was a soldier in
the war under Johnston and Lee and was a personal friend of Jefferson
Davis. He received his education under his mother's direction; in the
public schools and high school; in Stewart College; and was in the
Southwestern Presbyterian University at Clarksville, Tennessee, until
1873. He also attended the grammar school of Dr. J. B. Shearer at
Chester Springs, Va.; studied law under Hon. James E. Bailey at
Clarksville, Tenn., was admitted to the bar at nineteen; in 1876-77
served as private secretary to Mr. Bailey, then United States senator;
from 1877 to 1881 was city attorney at Clarksville; was a member of the
Tennessee legislature 1881-82; from 1883-87 practiced law in Chicago and
in 1887 located in Birmingham. He founded the Birmingham News on March
14, 1888. He was one of the promoters of the old Commercial Club,
afterward the Chamber of Commerce which he served as president. He was a
democrat and served as a delegate at large from Alabama to the National
Democratic Conventions of 1892 and 1904; was a member and vestryman of
the Church of the Advent, Episcopal; and held military commissions from
the governor of Tennessee, the governor of Illinois, the governor of
Alabama and at the time of his death was brigadier general of the Ninth
Congressional district. In 1906 the University of Alabama conferred upon
him the LL. D. Degree. At the time of his death he was second vice
president of the Associated Press. Married: June 27, 1882, at
Clarksville, Tenn., to Margaret Smith, daughter of Christopher H. and
Lucy (Dabney) Smith. Last residence: Birmingham.
Source: History of Alabama and
dictionary of Alabama biography, Volume 4 By Thomas McAdory Owen, Marie
Bankhead Owen, 1921 - Transcribed by AFOFG
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
ofninety-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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