Celebrating the big 1-2-5
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| Anniston, as it appeared in 1882. Photo: Special to The Star |
Henry Grady, who turned the Atlanta Constitution into a nationally prominent publication in a few short years, is credited with giving Anniston's newspaper its maiden name, The Hot Blast.
The inspiration, we're told, came when Grady, in Anniston for a visit to this model city, noted the sparks shooting out from the company town's foundry. "Hot Blast" seemed like a nifty handle for a paper covering this northeast Alabama community.
On Aug. 18, The Anniston Star, the descendant of The Hot Blast, will celebrate its 125th birthday. The paper's not alone in hitting the big 1-2-5. In early July, the city of Anniston marked 125 years of existence. Jacksonville State marks its 125th year in 2008 as well.
The Star has created something we believe worthy of the anniversary. From July 27 through Aug. 18, we will present four special sections examining The Model City's history and its future.
We will look backwards, to Samuel Noble and Daniel Tyler's grand experiment at creating a different sort of company town, one that treated workers fairly, created a foundation for a high-functioning community and aspired to lift the South from its post-war doldrums. We will examine how that endeavor changed — for good and for bad — over the decades.
These sections are an attempt to extract lessons from our past that can be applied to our future.
We do this because this newspaper believes a community can't know where it's going until it's sure of where it's been. Each week's historical review, divided by eras — 1870s-1928, 1929-1970 and 1971-present — informs us of how ordinary men and women faced the challenges of their day.
Our fourth special section, on Aug. 17, will look forward to Anniston's future, inviting the community to act as boldly and as publicly-minded as Tyler and Noble did in their day.
On Aug. 18, The Star's anniversary, we'll offer a special fifth section — a "Then and Now" photo album.
We hope you will find this series informative and challenging, as bracing as the whoosh of warm air blowing out of an iron furnace.
