Guide to the Canebrake Collection MSS.0267
Canebrake Collection
- Publication:
W.S. Hoole Special Collections Library, The University of Alabama
Mary Harmon Bryant Hall
February 2009
500 Hackberry Lane
Box 870266
Tuscaloosa, Alabama, 35487-0266
205.348.0500
archives@ua.edu
- Creation:
This finding aid was produced using the Archivists' Toolkit 2012-12-05T10:24-0600
- Language Usage:
English
- Description Rules:
Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Canebrake collection
- Unit ID:
MSS.0267
- Repository:
W.S. Hoole Special Collections Library, The University of Alabama
- Quantity:
0.2 Linear feet
- Dates:
circa 1837?
- Abstract:
Materials relating principally to the community of Dayton in Marengo County, Alabama. It includes land grants, the Dayton city code, town council minutes, and some family records.
Scope and Contents note
A miscellany of materials relating principally to the community of Dayton in Marengo County, Alabama. It includes land grants, the Dayton city code, town council minutes, and some family records.
- Preferred Citation:
Preferred Citation note
Canebrake Collection, W.S. Hoole Special Collections Library, The University of Alabama
- Acquisition Information:
Provenance
Gift of Kitty Grey Long, 199?, addition, 1995
- Access Restrictions:
Conditions Governing Access note
None
- Usage Restrictions:
Conditions Governing Use note
None
- Processing Information:
Processed by
S. Braden, 2009; updated by Martha Bace, 2012
Biographical/Historical note
The Canebrake refers to a historical region of west central Alabama that was once dominated by thickets of Arundinaria, a type of bamboo, or cane, native to North America. It was centered on the junction of the Tombigbee and Black Warrior rivers, near Demopolis, and extended eastward to include large parts of Hale, Marengo, and Perry counties. Portions of Greene and Sumter were also often included. Cane thickets once covered hundreds of thousands of acres in Alabama, but this area, lying within the Black Belt, had the most extensive stands and was known as "The Canebrake." It was noted by naturalist William Bartram as he traveled along the Tombigbee River in 1775, that the cane was as "thick as a man's arm, or three or four inches in diameter; I suppose one joint of some of them would contain above a quart of water." The cane began to disappear with the large-scale arrival of white settlers following the Creek Wars. The settler's introduced crops that replaced the native cane and their suppression of fire allowed the cane in other areas to be overtaken by species that would have naturally been kept in check by fire
Source(s)
Alabama (localbroad)
Black Belt (Ala. and Miss.) (lcsh)
Community and Place (localbroad)
Daily Life and Family (localbroad)
Dayton (Ala.) (lcsh)
Dayton (Ala.)--History (lcsh)
Early Alabama History (Local)
Family papers (aat)
Land grants (aat)
Marengo County (Ala.) (lcsh)
Minutes (aat)
Canebrake Box 711