Guide to the Tuscaloosa, Alabama, Service Men's Center Scrapbook MSS.1604

A scrapbook containing photographs, letters, greeting cards, newspaper clippings, activity programs, patches, magazines, military insignia descriptions, and other miscellaneous items. The scrapbook focuses on the activities held at the service men's center rather than Northington Hospital. Some of the newspaper clippings, however, do relate to the latter. The scrapbook is not arranged chronologically.

The Tuscaloosa Junior Chamber of Commerce established the Service Men's Center, a facility for entertaining military personal stationed in the area, in January 1943. Mrs. Elizabeth Morley was its hostess. The Center was originally intended to host young American, British, and French men who were in the Army Specialized Training Program at the University of Alabama, pilots training at the Van De Graff Airport, and Air Corps cadets training at the University of Alabama. Over one hundred carefully chosen ladies between the ages of eighteen and thirty served as hostesses to these young, healthy men. Soon, however, the healthy men left Tuscaloosa and were replaced by wounded soldiers at the Northington General Hospital in Tuscaloosa. Northington was constructed in 1943 and during the war became the world's largest burn hospital, specializing in plastic surgery. The hostesses not only entertained soldiers at the Service Men's Center, they also visited soldiers at Northington, where the auditorium served as a dance hall. The hostesses offered therapy though kindness to scarred soldiers and helped them re-enter the public world. The service center provided a safe environment for service men to spend time with young ladies from Tuscaloosa and the University of Alabama and to enjoy games, sports, dinners, dances, plays, and other activities. Originally located at 1922 Broad Street, the Tuscaloosa Service Men's Center moved to what is now the University Club of the University of Alabama on September 1, 1943.