A Photo Journey of My Dad's Childhood - Birmingham, Alabama in the 1940's and 1950's

Hi everyone! I want to share a late Father's Day post to honor my dad, who has taught me how to live. There are so many verbs that I could have added to that sentence (who has taught me how to create, think, explore, ect) but that list could go on forever, so thank you to my dad for teaching me how to live my life. No words can express how much I love and look up to my dad. I want to share some photos from his childhood in the 1940's, growing up in Birmingham, Alabama.

---

---

This is a photo of my grandfather and grandmother with my dad and his two siblings, Peggy and Aggie. My dad grew up with 5 other siblings. My grandfather had a tough childhood, having to drop out of school in the 4th grade during the great depression to work in order to make money for his family. He became an alcoholic for the rest of his life. Their family was very poor, and my grandmother took care of their 6 children. When she started to train to become a nurse, she had to go to Mobile for nursing school. She knew that my grandfather wouldn't be able to take care of the 6 children, so she sent them to the Catholic orphanage across town. My dad and his siblings grew up in the orphanage. When my grandmother finished nursing school, she returned home and soon contracted early Parkinson's disease in her 30's. She was no longer able to work as a nurse. When boys hit puberty, they weren't allowed to stay in the orphanage in Birmingham - at the age of 11 my dad was going to be separated from his siblings and have to go to an orphanage in another city. Instead, his Uncle Gerome financially supported my dad to move back home with his mother and father.

---

---

This photo was taken in the 1920's. It is of my grandmother traveling with her father to see Lookout Mountain in Tennessee. She is pictured with some relatives and her banjo. My grandmother was adopted and grew up in Montgomery. We think that her mother died in the flu epidemic. After she was adopted, her adoptive mother died. She was raised by her adopted dad, who was close friends with my grandfather's father. They moved in with my grandfather's father's family of 11 children, which is how my grandmother and grandfather met.

---

---

This is a photo of my grandfather.

---

---

This is a photo of my grandmother and my dad's uncle Gerome sitting next to each other, along with my great grandfather and two other relatives. My dad's uncle Gerome (my grandfather's cousin), was always in love with my grandmother, and was a surrogate father to my dad.

---

---

This is a photo of my grandfather visiting my aunts in the orphanage.

---

---

This is a photo of my grandfather visiting my dad and my aunts in the orphanage.

---

---

This is a photo of my dad, his four sisters, and his sister Anita's foster family. My aunts Anita and Barbara were too young to go to the orphanage when my grandmother went to nursing school, so they spent a few years in foster care before joining my dad and Peggy and Aggie in the orphanage.

---

---

This photo is of my aunts Barbara and Anita with my grandmother and one of the children of the foster family.

---

---

This is a photo of my grandmother with my Aunt Barbara.

---

---

This is a photo of my dad's family on Easter. My dad would save up the whole year by doing odd jobs around the neighborhood like cutting lawns. He would then have enough money to buy his mother and two older sisters orchids for Easter.

---

---

This is a photo in 1946 of my maternal grandfather along with my dad and 3 of his sisters. My dad's uncle had just returned from WWII in the navy. They took his uncles old navy pant suits, cut them up, and made a sailor suit for my dad.

---

---

This is a photo of my dad and three of his sisters.

---

---

This is a photo of my dad, three of his sisters, and one of the foster family's children.

---

---

This is a photo of my dad's family's big summer outing to the creek for a picnic. During the summer, my dad and his sisters would return from the orphanage to live at home for a month. They would spend that month going to the neighborhood park and community center, which had a basketball court, theater, crocheting classes, chess, tennis, ect.

---

---

This is a photo of my dad and his mom.

---

---

This is a photo of the family on their big summer picnic.

---

---

I hope you've enjoyed these photos! Also I just realized that last year on Father's Day I made my third ever post on Steemit, which means many of us have been Steeming for over a year now! Wow, that's incredible.
Happy belated Father's day to all of the amazing fathers out there!