Flotte’s Notes on
An Unofficial Encyclopaedia
of Mobile & Baldwin Counties
Promoting local history, culture, outdoors,
businesses, attractions, food, people, and places
Please submit all comments, additions, and
corrections to: admin@flotte2.com
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Mobile
·
As of 2003
·
The county seat is
·
The racial makeup of
·
The median income for a household in the county was
$33,710, and the median income for a family was $40,378. The per capita income
was $17,178. 18% of the population is
below the poverty line
Mobile
·
Mobile
County Organizational Chart
·
There are 3 county commission
districts and seats.
o
District 1: Merceria Ludgood
was elected Oct. 2007.
o
District 2: Stephen Nodine Nodine is a former
o
District 3: Mike Dean is a
former two-term state legislator and
·
The county
charges each property owner a 6½-mill property tax for money spent on specific
Pay-As-You-Go projects approved by voters. Before 2004, all the money was spent
on road or bridge work, but residents have since voted to let the money be used
for incentives and buildings, as well. The fund brings in about $22 million a
year.
·
The Mobile
County Commission and voters have approved an $83.5 million contribution to the
Thyssen-Krupp incentives package.
o Up to $156.9 million will come from the county's
Pay-As-You-Go fund, and will be spent over 30 years to pay $70 million in bonds
that will be sold to pay the county's incentives which will be about $5 million
a year. As part of the deal, the state will spend about $75 million to widen
and expand
o The county must file a validation lawsuit so
investors can be sure there are no legal issues surrounding the vote. County
officials will then get insurance and a bond rating and should be able to sell
the bonds by the end of the year
o A consortium of other area city and county
governments has met to consider sharing a portion of that amount -- estimates
range from $13.5 million to $20 million, but none of those governments have
formally agreed to any payments. Stephen
Nodine said he plans to ask
o Of its $83.5 million, the county will get back about
$45 million through the state transportation department paying to widen and
expand
·
Mobile County
Sheriff’s Office
o The Mobile County Sheriff is Sam Cochran
o 2006 Mobile County
Sheriff’s Office Calls Hotspots
·
South Alabama
Regional Planning Commission
·
The Mobile
Metropolitan Planning Organization
conducts the Mobile Area Transportation Planning Process.
o The MPO includes the cities of Creola,
Satsuma, Saraland, Chickasaw,
o The Governor designates a Metropolitan Planning
Organization (MPO) in each urban area having a population of at least 50,000
people or greater (as per the Federal Highway Act of 1962).
o Mobile County
Traffic Counts
Mobile
·
An 1861 map has towns
labeled for
·
Current Municipalities are: Mobile, Bayou
La Batre, Chickasaw, Citronelle, Creola,
Dauphin Island, Mount
Vernon, Prichard, Saraland,
Satsuma, Theodore
|
Name |
Population |
Incorporated |
|
201,181 |
1819 |
|
|
34,311 |
1925 |
|
|
11,784 |
1957 |
|
|
7,000 |
1959 |
|
|
6,649 |
1946 |
|
|
4,000 |
1892 |
|
|
Bayou La Batre |
3,000 |
1955 |
|
Creola |
2,050 |
|
|
1,200 |
1988 |
|
|
|
1,037 |
1959 |
·
U.S. Highway 43 was later built along this route.
·
In the 1940s, as
·
Beginning in the 1950s, chemical and other industrial
plants were built between US 43 and the
o
Enviromental concerns about the
·
Towns on US 45 (north to south):
·
Population 829 (2003)
·
Ellicott’s Stone is
a boundary marker placed in 1799 by a joint U.S.-Spanish survey party. It
marked 31° North latitude: the east-west line between the U.S. Mississippi
Territory and Spanish West
·
In 1799 the
o
o
In 1807, Aaron
Burr was captured in
o
Some Choctaws
remained near
·
In 1830,
President Andrew Jackson established the federal Mount Vernon Arsenal
three miles west of old
o
The Arsenal was
appropriated by Confederacy in 1861 and its equipment moved to
o
1887-1894
The Arsenal held about 450 Apache prisoners of war, including Geronimo. Rather loosely incarcerated,
he served as internal justice of the peace for the prisoners, and supposedly
would greet local trains, selling the passengers autographed trinkets. The
Apaches were allowed to bury their own dead, and did so secretly, with Delta
riverbanks the rumored location.
o
Among the post
surgeons at
o
The Arsenal was
deeded to the State of
·
o
o
Its name was
changed in 1919 to
o
Treatment for
all citizens began in 1969.
o
Nine of
structures dating from the 1830's are still in use, including the
Superintendent's House,
o Physician E.L. McCafferty did important research at Searcy into the dietary
disorder pellagra. George Washington Carver sent him peanut oil as a possible
treatment.
·
The Chastang settlement near Chastang's Bluff is represented by the large and
interesting colored Creole colony
who live in the vicinity. They claim descent from Dr. John Chastang of Spanish
times but really go back to the French
period, of which their patois is an interesting reminder.
·
The group of
north
·
The Kirk House & Garden was built
in 1914
Creola
·
Population 5,872 (2003)
·
Philip
Satsuma of
·
Satsumas once grew in abundance in the area once known as "Fig
Tree Island," on the Pace Orange Orchard. In 1910 Pace Orange Orchard had about 100 acres of pecans and satsuma trees on the area
·
The
·
In 1922 a packing
house built that still stands above Mac's Landing
·
Between 1912 and1924 the satsuma trees damaged by cold weather & citrus canker
·
In 1959 Satsuma was
incorporated
Saraland
·
From the time of
the French settlement at
·
Don Diego
Alvarez acquired Saraland through a Spanish land
grant; the land was given the name Alvarez
Station by his descendants.