Mobile’s commitment to public health has been a component of the city’s illustrious history since its founding in 1702. The Board of Health was officially established in 1816 as the [more]

Born in 1905, in Toadvine, Jefferson County, Ida Vines Moffett was a lifelong champion of compassionate care. Always dressed in her traditional white uniform, she advocated constant contact with patients [more]

Founded in December 1916, the Alabama Dry Dock and Shipbuilding Company, or ADD-S-CO, was an important component of the maritime industry of Mobile for much of the twentieth century, helping [more]

Decatur native Mae Jemison is a physician and former astronaut who became the first African American woman to go into space. Jemison was chosen as one of 15 candidates from [more]

Experiencing both boom and bust, the coal-mining industry has played an huge role in Alabama’s economy. During the 1840s, entrepreneurs discovered four large coal fields and soon vastly expanded the [more]

The George C. Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville has been the heart of the U.S. space program since its beginnings in the late 1950s.   Marshall Space Flight Center was [more]

William Crawford Gorgas was born on October 3, 1854, in Toulminville, Alabama. Gorgas was a pioneer in the field of public health and tropical medicine and his work in eradicating [more]

Montgomery native Kathryn C. Thornton is a physicist and former NASA astronaut. A veteran of four space flights, Thornton has logged over 975 hours in space, including more than 21 [more]

E. O. Wilson, known as the “father of biodiversity,” is a naturalist, environmentalist, ecologist, entomologist and humanist. Born in Birmingham, Wilson moved around in childhood and grew up largely in [more]

Eugene Allen Smith was a professor of chemistry and mineralogy at the University of Alabama. As state geologist he was tasked with traveling throughout the state to document its resources. [more]