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The area around Toadvine was settled by white people as early as 1813 (who happened to be my ancestors). Of course there were Native Americans in the area. Local legend says that where Toadvine is today was once the site of a Cherokee village. Some of the Indians mixed with the settlers and others moved away. Later two grist mills were built in Toadvine. Over the nineteenth century Toadvine became the local hub of commerce. When the War Between the States began many locals went off to fight for the Confederates though very few locals owned slaves. However, one of those few slaves had been a highly respected preacher at Rock Creek Baptist Church, then a white and black church nearby (of which I am a member). He was commended in Alabama's first history book, The Rise and History of the Baptists in Alabama, written by Alabama Convention founder, historian, and local pastor Hosea Holcombe. An area gunsmith, and my great-great-great-great uncle, Cape Smith, was captured and thrown into an Union prison in Rock Island, Illinois. The war had weighed heavily on his mind and another prisoner named Nash, who was very large in stature, was harrassing Smith and taking advantage of his shaky state of mind. (How could you not be shaky when you were in the middle of the bloodiest and most horrific period in American history!) After a while another prisoner, a John Toadvine from Georgia, beat up Nash. Toadvine and Cape Smith then became very good friends. He told Toadvine that when he returned to Alabama he was going to do something in honor of him. Soon after Cape Smith returned from the War, the area got a post office, Smith was named postmaster and named he it in honor of Toadvine. Soon the small town became known as Toadvine as well. As the industrial city of Bessemer began to grow to the east, Toadvine's growing influence began to diminish. Though it had once been the site of a heated debate between candidates for governor (Thomas G. Jones and Reuben F. Kolb), and had the statement, "As goes Toadvine, so goes Jefferson County," attached to it in regard to politics, the two growing cities to the east, Bessemer and Birmingham, grew immensely and became the politically influential of the county. As time passed, Toadvine's stores and mills closed. Soon only the church, two cemetaries, and ruins of the mills were left. Later a few locals apparently tired of dealing with the strange name changed the name of the church to "Smithville" but locals have never accepted it as anything more than the name of the church- and some even still call it Toadvine Church.. Toadvine has produced some great people. Natives of the area include Ida Vines Moffet, who was famed for her work in making the Alabama Baptist Medical System successful and for whom the Samford University school of nursing is named; Jim Caswell Waldrop, Jr. who as a reporter for the Birmingham News-Age Herald, Atlanta Journal and others interviewed such people as Dwight D.Eisenhower and Lyndon B.Johnson; Charles Woods, a decorated war hero and businessman who has run for U.S. Senate in California and Alabama; a current U.S. Army general; and Howell Vines, an author in the 1920's and 30's and English instructor at Harvard U and professor at Rice U.; oh and of course me- haha. |
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