BAMA MAMMOTHS: November 2023

These images from the 150 YEAR OLD book MENTAL PHOTOGRAPHS give you in the present-day a CLEAR WINDOW to peer back through over a century and a half of time & into the lives of THE MOST ADVANCED SET OF PEOPLE IN TUSCALOOSA in 1872.

During the Civil War, John S. Kennedy's cotton mill in Lauderdale County (Florence) was burned by the Yankees so he brought his family to Tuscaloosa and invested in Tuscaloosa's cotton mill which was located near the present-day MERCEDES-BENZ AMPHITHEATER by the Black Warrior River.

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/68711588/john-spinks-kennedy

The Yankees burned that mill in April, 1865 and Mr. Kennedy then rebuilt the mill by the railroad tracks in present-day Cottondale. The village that built up around the mill was named Kennedale after Mr. Kennedy. Later that village would be renamed Cottondale. According to Matt Clinton, in 1871, the year before Kennedy's daughter received her copy of MENTAL PHOTOGRAPHS, Kennedy's company operated 5,000 spindles and 100 looms and used 1000 bales of cotton annually. In 1875 the number of looms was increased to 205 and further expansion was planned.

MENTAL PHOTOGRAPHS of Tuscaloosa's J.C. Perkins and Mamie Kennedy Perkins Family in 1872

~ Mamie Kennedy (1858-1952) received her copy of MENTAL PHOTOGRAPHS as a Christmas present in 1872 when she was 15 years old. Two of her brothers, David Patton Kennedy (1856-1888) and Edward Jennings Kennedy (1856-1888) filled out pages in Mental Photographs in 1873 while they were both cadets in the Alabama Corps of Cadets at the University of Alabama along with Cadet J.C. Perkins, future husband of Mamie Kennedy.

The Kennedy sister and the two Kennedy brothers were the children of John Spinks Kennedy (1818-1899), founder of the cotton mills at Kennedale which was renamed Cottondale. John Spinks Kennedy (1818-1899) - Find a Grave Memorial

Her future husband, J.C. Perkins, filled out his page in MENTAL PHOTOGRAPHS on January 20, 1873 when he was a 19-year-old cadet at the University of Alabama. They were married on November 27, 1878.

from page 163 of HISTORY OF THE FIRST METHODIST CHURCH OF TUSCALOOSA, ALABAMA by James Sellers (1968):

"All through the last years of the nineteenth century and well into the twentieth, the Kennedys and their in-laws, the Perkinses, were the directors and leaders of the musical life of their church. They were a remarkable family. There was brother Edward, 'a little man who wore thick glasses." https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/190098310/edward-jennings-kennedy

"He was organist for close to twenty years. There was sister, Mary, who as Mrs. J.C. Perkins, directed the choir, and who was organist for an even longer period than Edward. She sang in the choir for some forty years. She was a charter member of the Tuscaloosa Music Teachers Association and the Tuscaloosa Music Study Club. Until her death in 1952, a the age of ninety-three, she was a loyal and valued member of the Woman's Society. Her husband and other Perkins relatives were also musically inclined. It is said that Mr. Wilbur H. Perkins served the choir for at least twenty years, and that Mr. E.C. Perkins, now (1963) one of the oldest living members of the church, sang his first choir solo when he was only six years old."

Singers are J.R. Kennedy Jr., brother of Mamie Kennedy Perkins(owner of MENTAL PHOTOGRAPHS) https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/39634219/john-robie-kennedy

and Edwin C. Perkins, brother of Mamie Kennedy Perkins' husband, J. C. Perkins, with two unidentified individuals pretending to serenade. https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/217900023/edwin-constantine-perkins

Mrs. J. C. Perkins (Mamie Kennedy Perkins, owner of MENTAL PHOTOGRAPHS) stands beside one of the first bicycles seen in the Tuscaloosa area.

Embroidery Float in the Tuscaloosa Centennial Parade, 1916

On the float that participated in the Tuscaloosa Centennial Parade are Mrs. M.T. Maxwell, Mrs. J.C. Perkins, Mrs. H.B. Foster and Mrs. B. Turner. The building in the background is the Tuscaloosa Female College on Queen City Avenue. The Tuscaloosa News on May 30, 1916 described the float as " unique in design with a trellis of wisteria protected and served as a frame for living pictures of the olden days in antebellum costumes, powdered hair, painted faces, patches galore, at spinning wheels, and thus presenting Tuscaloosa's second oldest club which has existed nearly 25 years."

Julian Perkins 1853-1917 : https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/190098209/julian-c-perkins

Mamie S. Kennedy Perkins 1858-1952

Mary S “Mammie” Kennedy Perkins (1858-1952) - Find a Grave Memorial

~ Mamie Kennedy received her copy of MENTAL PHOTOGRAPHS as a Christmas present in 1872 when she was 15 years old. Her future husband, J.C. Perkins, filled out his page in MENTAL PHOTOGRAPHS on January 20, 1873 when he was a 19-year-old cadet at the University of Alabama. They were married on November 27, 1878.

Postcard Back - Demopolis: Washington Street

Julian C. Perkins when he was a 19 year old cadet @ the University of Alabama. Julian C Perkins (1853-1917) - Find a Grave Memorial

Cadet D.P. Kennedy, 16 year old brother of the owner of MENTAL PHOTOGRAPHS, Mamie Kennedy Perkins, was a student at the University of Alabama. https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/130758433/david-patton-kennedy

from the August 11, 1875 Tuscaloosa Weekly Times

University of Alabama Cadet Edward Jennings Kennedy, 18 year old brother of the owner of MENTAL PHOTOGRAPHS, Mamie Kennedy Perkins. https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/190098310/edward-jennings-kennedy

from page 137 of THE FIRST METHODIST CHURCH OF TUSCALOOSA, ALABAMA 1818-1968 by James B. Sellers (1968)

"One of the his first undertakings (Rev. Robert Nabors) after arrival in 1880 was the acquisition of a new organ to enrich services of the church. He acted with such dispatch that the TUSCALOOSA CLARION was able, within two weeks of his coming, to announce: 'The Methodist Church is to have a new organ.' And by spring the new organ was in place.

"Credit for raising the $1,200, the CLARION noted, belonged largely to Edward Jennings Kennedy who had put a great deal of energy into getting the necessary subscriptions, and who was on hand in March, 1880, when representatives of the organ's builders, the Samuel S. Hammill Company of East Cambridge, Massachusetts, arrived in Tuscaloosa to install the new instrument. Mr. Hammill himself superintended the installation and was a guest for ten days of Mr. J.S. Kennedy."

May 28, 1905 obituary for E.J. Kennedy~

"He (E.J. Kennedy) was a man of bright mind and rare intelligence. He was a member of the class of 1874 at the University. He was a musical genius. Had his remarkable gifts in this direction been properly cultivated, he would have made a notable artist. As it was, he was a musician of rare powers. There was no instrument that he could not play with considerable degree of proficiency and he was a genuinely beautiful organist. He was organist of the Methodist church for 25 years, during which time the music of the Methodist church was famed all over the state. He gave up the organ several years ago on account of failing health. He was the only person in this section of the country who knew the mechanism of the pipe organ and it was upon him devolved the duty of keeping them all in order. He was especially gifted in a mechanical way and had a particular turn for electrical contrivances. He installed and conducted the first telephone exchange in Tuscaloosa. He composed a number of pieces of music that were published and proved exceedingly popular. He had the natural gift of harmony and could arrange music with great facility and his improvisations were exquisite. Though of modest and unselfish a spirit he had an established place in the esteem of the people generally and his place will be a hard one to fill."

Rose Mary Perkins was the 10 year old granddaughter of Mamie Kennedy Perkins. She received her grandmother's copy of MENTAL PHOTOGRAPHS in 1923, 51 years after it was given to her grandmother. Her father, Julian Herbert Perkins (1888-1958) was Mamie Kennedy Perkins and J.C. Perkins' son.