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Death in Alabama's mines was a grim fact in the first half of the 20th century. Falling rocks, cave-ins, explosions, electrocutions, fire, machinery accidents, and runaway mine cars took the lives of Alabama miners both collectively and one by one. From 1898 through 1938, Alabama mine inspectors recorded 2,188 deaths in the coalmines. The Alabama Coal Mine Fatalities Database compiled in the Government Documents Department of the Birmingham Public Library identifies the miners, the mines, the dates the men died, and the accidents that killed them.

The Alabama Episcopal Church Registers are a part of the records of the Episcopal Diocese of Alabama preserved in the Archives of the Birmingham Public Library. The Alabama Episcopal Church Registers lists confirmations, baptisms, marriages, burials and more for 14000+ people in a growing list of Alabama parishes.

Be it known that I, Mary Anderson, a citizen of the United States, residing at Birmingham, in the county of Jefferson and state of Alabama, have invented a new and useful Improvement in Window-Cleaning Devices, of which the following is a specification. So begin the words of the famous patent granted on November 10, 1902, for the first version of windshield wipers. Within ten years, this Alabama innovation became a standard feature on automobiles. Scanned images of the original documents of this patent and thousands of others issued to inventive Alabamians are available from the United States Patent and Trademark Office by way of the Alabama Inventors Database, a project of the Government Documents Department of the Birmingham Public Library.

Jefferson County Probate Court, Loose Records is an Index for Boxes 1-637 (Birmingham) and Bessemer - 1916-1936. (Note: Boxes 1-637 refers to the Woodruff Boxes (Drawers) the cases were originally filed as -- not the archival boxes they are in now.)

The Obituary Index : Birmingham Area Newspapers database is an ongoing project of the Government Documents Department of the Birmingham Public Library. Obituaries from three Birmingham area newspapers are included: the Birmingham News, the Birmingham World, and the Methodist Christian Advocate.

Birmingham's startling growth in the late 19th century brought instant prosperity and fame for the privileged. To the less fortunate, urban life delivered its portion of misery, disease, and poverty. In 1888 Judge Alexander O. Lane purchased land on the south side of Red Mountain to create a burial ground for the indigent dead. By 1906, 4,711 paupers were buried in Red Mountain Cemetery, now the site of Lane Park and the Birmingham Zoo. The database for the Red Mountain Cemetery Record of Interments preserves the records of these deaths and provides fragments of information about the lives these individuals once lived.

The "WPA Index to Alabama Biography" was a Works Progress Administration project begun in the 1930's then abandoned when funding for the WPA was curtailed. Although the index was never completed, over 97 titles such as Who's Who in America, other biographical dictionaries, and local histories were indexed by the workers. It is an invaluable tool for researching Alabama biographical sources.