Alabama

Some interesting facts about the fair state -

• Alabama introduced the Mardi Gras to the western world.
• Alabama workers built the first rocket to put humans on the moon.
• Alabama is the only state with all major natural resources needed to make iron and steel. It is also the largest supplier of cast-iron and steel pipe products.
• Montgomery is the capital and the birthplace of the Confederate States of America.
• The Confederate flag was designed and first flown in Alabama in 1861.
• Alabama became the 22nd state on December 14, 1819.
• Baseball player Henry Louis (Hank) Aaron was born in Mobile in 1934.
• Baseball player Willie Howard Mays was born in Westfield in 1931.
• Huntsville is known as the rocket capital of the World.
• In 1902 Dr. Luther Leonidas Hill performed the first open heart surgery in the Western Hemisphere by suturing a stab wound in a young boy's heart. The surgery occurred in Montgomery.
• Hitler's typewriter survived from his mountain retreat and is exhibited at the Hall of History in Bessemer.
• The pecan is the official nut.
• People from Alabama are called Alabamians.
• On January 11, 1861 Alabama becomes the fourth state to secede from the Union.
• Tallulah Bankhead was born in Huntsville in 1902 and died in 1968.
• Singer and entertainer Nathaniel Adams (Nat King) Cole was born in Montgomery in 1919 and died in 1965.
• The Birmingham Airport opened in 1931. At the time of the opening a Birmingham to Los Angeles flight took 19 hours.
• General Andrew Jackson defeated the Creek Indians in 1814. Following the event the Native Americans ceded nearly half the present state land to the United States.
• At the Battle of Mobile Bay Admiral David Farragut issued his famous command, "Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead." The event occurred on August 5, 1864.