Iron and steel dominate Birmingham's mind, activities
and life. The very ground of Red Mountain is red because of the iron ore
that it contains, and those who reside upon the charming slopes of this
hill do not own their land in fee simple, but subject always to the
mineral rights of mining companies.
The only other industry of Birmingham which is to be compared, in
magnitude or efficiency, with the steel industry is that of "cutting in"
at dances. All through the South it is carried on, but whereas in such
cities as Memphis, New Orleans and Atlanta, men show a little mercy to
the stranger--realizing that, as he is presumably unacquainted with all
the ladies at a dance, he cannot retaliate in kind--Birmingham is
merciless and prosecutes the pestilential practice unremittingly, even
going so far as to apply the universal-service principle and call out
her highschool youths to carry on the work. Before I went to certain
dances in Birmingham I felt that high-school boys ought to be kept at
home at night, but after attending these dances I realized that such
restriction was altogether inadequate, and that the only way to deal
with them effectively would be to pickle them in vitriol.
Where, in other cities of the South, I have managed to dance as much as
half a dance without interruption, I never danced more than twenty feet
with one partner in Birmingham.
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