Hayneville is a town in Lowndes County,

Alabama (We dare defend our rights) , anthem = "Alabama (state song), Alabama" , image_map = Alabama in United States.svg , seat = Montgomery, Alabama, Montgomery , LargestCity = Huntsville, Alabama, Huntsville , LargestCounty = Baldwin County, Al ...

, United States and its

county seat A county seat is an administrative center, seat of government, or capital city of a county or civil parish. The term is in use in Canada, China, Hungary, Romania, Taiwan, and the United States. The equivalent term shire town is used in the US st ...

. At the 2010 census the population was 932, down from its record high of 1,177 in 2000. It is also part of the Montgomery

Metropolitan Statistical Area In the United States, a metropolitan statistical area (MSA) is a geographical region with a relatively high population density at its core and close economic ties throughout the area. Such regions are neither legally Incorporated town, incorporate ...

. It initially incorporated in 1831, but lapsed, finally reincorporating in 1967. Before 1970, the town appeared only twice on the U.S. Census: in 1850 and 1890. The 1850 estimate of 800 residents ranked it as the largest town in the county at the time. Located in the fertile Black Belt region, Hayneville was the county seat in a plantation economy after Native Americans were removed that used slave labor for

cotton production Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective case, around the seeds of the cotton plants of the genus ''Gossypium'' in the mallow family Malvaceae. The fiber is almost pure cellulose, and can contain minor perce ...

. The town was later a railway terminus and home to the Hayneville Railway Company, which was organized in 1903. Two years later, the company was reorganized as the Hayneville & Montgomery Railroad Company and provided connections for shipping with the L&N Railroad Company's tracks.

History

Settlement (1820-1831)

Hayneville was founded in 1820 by settlers from the Edgefield, Abbeville, and Colleton districts of

South Carolina )''Animis opibusque parati'' ( for, , Latin, Prepared in mind and resources, links=no) , anthem = " Carolina";" South Carolina On My Mind" , Former = Province of South Carolina , seat = Columbia , LargestCity = Charleston , LargestMetro = ...

on property purchased from the U.S. Land Office at Cahawba. Throughout the 1820s, Hayneville was known as "Big Swamp". The indigenous

Muscogee Creek people The Muscogee, also known as the Mvskoke, Muscogee Creek, and the Muscogee Creek Confederacy ( in the Muscogee language), are a group of related indigenous (Native American) peoples of the Southeastern Woodlandsremoved to Indian Territory west of the

Mississippi River The Mississippi River is the second-longest river and chief river of the second-largest drainage system in North America, second only to the Hudson Bay drainage system. From its traditional source of Lake Itasca in northern Minnesota, it f ...

. In 1831, after being chosen as the county seat of Lowndes County, the town was officially named Hayneville in honor of

Robert Y. Hayne Robert Young Hayne (November 10, 1791 – September 24, 1839) was an American lawyer, planter and politician. He served in the United States Senate from 1823 to 1832, as Governor of South Carolina 1832–1834, and as Mayor of Charleston 1836– ...

, governor of

and a

U.S. senator The United States Senate is the upper chamber of the United States Congress, with the House of Representatives being the lower chamber. Together they compose the national bicameral legislature of the United States. The composition and powe ...

Late 19th and early 20th century

During the early part of the 20th century, the

boll weevil The boll weevil (''Anthonomus grandis'') is a beetle that feeds on cotton buds and flowers. Thought to be native to Central Mexico, it migrated into the United States from Mexico in the late 19th century and had infested all U.S. cotton-growing ...

invaded the South, destroying cotton crops across the most productive counties. In the latter half of the 20th century, the agricultural focus shifted to more diverse crops and livestock. Hayneville, like the rest of the Black Belt, has struggled to develop a prosperous economy. Lowndes County Training School was established in Hayneville in 1913.

Civil Rights Era and "Bloody Lowndes" (1965)

Despite the county's black majority, it had no registered black voters in the spring of 1965, after more than 60 years of disenfranchisement under the

Alabama Constitution The Constitution of the State of Alabama is the basic governing document of the U.S. state of Alabama. It was adopted in 2022 and is Alabama's seventh constitution. History Alabama has had seven constitutions to date, all but the current one est ...

. Civil rights activists worked in Hayneville and Lowndes to organize residents in preparation for registration and voting. After passage of the federal

Voting Rights Act of 1965 The Voting Rights Act of 1965 is a landmark piece of federal legislation in the United States that prohibits racial discrimination in voting. It was signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson during the height of the civil rights movement ...

in August, activists provided residents with political education and helped them register to vote. They continued to work to integrate stores and public facilities. On August 13, 1965,

Jonathan Daniels Jonathan Myrick Daniels (March 20, 1939 – August 20, 1965) was an Episcopal seminarian and civil rights activist. In 1965, he was killed by a special county deputy, Tom Coleman, who was a construction worker, in Hayneville, Alabama, while ...

, an Episcopal seminarian from

New Hampshire New Hampshire is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Gulf of Maine to the east, and the Canadian province of Quebec t ...

, worked with a group of 29 civil rights protesters to picket whites-only stores in the small town of Fort Deposit. All of the protesters were arrested by county police and taken to jail in nearby Hayneville. Five juvenile protesters were released the next day. The rest of the group was held for six days; they refused to accept bail unless everyone was bailed. On August 20, the prisoners were released without transport back to Fort Deposit. After release, the group waited by a road nearby the jail. Daniels, along with three others — a white Catholic priest and two black women activists—went to buy soft drinks at Varner's Grocery Store, one of the few local stores that would serve non-whites. There, they encountered Tom L. Coleman, an engineer for the state highway department and unpaid special county deputy wielding a

shotgun A shotgun (also known as a scattergun, or historically as a fowling piece) is a long gun, long-barreled firearm designed to shoot a straight-walled cartridge (firearms), cartridge known as a shotshell, which usually discharges numerous small p ...

. The man threatened the group, and finally leveled his gun at seventeen-year-old

Ruby Sales Ruby Nell Sales (born July 8, 1948 in Jemison, Alabama) is an African-American social justice activist, scholar, and public theologian. She has been described as a "legendary civil rights activist" by the PBS program ''Religion and Ethics Weekly' ...

. Daniels pushed Sales to the ground and caught the full blast of the gun, which killed him instantly. Father Richard F. Morrisroe grabbed the other protester and ran. Coleman shot Morrisroe, wounding him in the lower back. White resistance to civil rights organizers continued. In June 1965, Gregory Orr, a student from upstate New York who traveled to Mississippi to take part in civil rights protests, was driving home from the capital of

Jackson Jackson may refer to: People and fictional characters * Jackson (name), including a list of people and fictional characters with the surname or given name Places Australia * Jackson, Queensland, a town in the Maranoa Region * Jackson North, Qu ...

. He had been arrested there with other protesters and held without charges for 10 days at the state fairgrounds. While driving through Lowndes County, he was stopped by white

vigilantes Vigilantism () is the act of preventing, investigating and punishing perceived offenses and crimes without legal authority. A vigilante (from Spanish, Italian and Portuguese “vigilante”, which means "sentinel" or "watcher") is a person who ...

, kidnapped and held without charges for eight days in the Hayneville courthouse jail. Back in New York that August, Orr read a report of the murder of Jonathan Daniels in ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

.'' He recognized one of his kidnappers in a photograph—apparently Tom Coleman. Numerous other incidents have been documented in the county of violence against civil rights people. Civil rights activities in Lowndes continued in the county under the leadership of Stokeley Carmichael, the

Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC, often pronounced ) was the principal channel of student commitment in the United States to the civil rights movement during the 1960s. Emerging in 1960 from the student-led sit-ins at segrega ...

(SNCC) and local residents, to educate and register blacks to vote after passage of the

. They organized the

Lowndes County Freedom Organization The Lowndes County Freedom Organization (LCFO), also known as the Lowndes County Freedom Party (LCFP) or Black Panther party, was an American political party founded during 1965 in Lowndes County, Alabama. The independent third party was formed ...

(LFCO), the first independent black political party in the county since

Reconstruction era The Reconstruction era was a period in American history following the American Civil War (1861–1865) and lasting until approximately the Compromise of 1877. During Reconstruction, attempts were made to rebuild the country after the bloo ...

, and continued to register voters. They ran a slate of candidates in 1966 but lost due to election fraud in the majority-black county. In 1970, African-American chairman of LCFO

John Hulett John Hulett (November 19, 1927 – August 21, 2006) was an American civil rights activist, sheriff and judge. He was a leader in the civil rights movement in Lowndes County, Alabama, United States, and the founder of the Lowndes County Christian ...

was elected as county sheriff.

Incorporation (1967-1968)

The incorporation of Hayneville as a town began in July 1967 with the vision of 25 qualified electors of the county and residents of the Hayneville community. Two subsequent attempts were made for incorporation, the last resulting in favor of incorporation. Only one person filed for a statement of candidacy and was nominated for the office of Mayor and five places on the town council. Therefore, due to the completion of the requirements of incorporation, the court declared on July 15, 1968, by Probate Judge Harold Hammond, that Hayneville was completely incorporated.

Geography

Hayneville is located at (32.182365, -86.580468). According to the

U.S. Census Bureau The United States Census Bureau (USCB), officially the Bureau of the Census, is a principal agency of the U.S. Federal Statistical System, responsible for producing data about the American people and economy. The Census Bureau is part of the ...

, the town has a total area of , of which is land and 0.54% is water.

Demographics

As of the

census A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording and calculating information about the members of a given population. This term is used mostly in connection with national population and housing censuses; other common censuses incl ...

of 2000, there were 1,177 people, 409 households, and 294 families residing in the town. The population density was . There were 467 housing units at an average density of . The racial makeup of the town was 85.47%

Black Black is a color which results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without hue, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness. Black and white have o ...

African American African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ens ...

, 13.42%

White White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no hue). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully reflect and scatter all the visible wavelengths of light. White on ...

, 0.17%

Asian Asian may refer to: * Items from or related to the continent of Asia: ** Asian people, people in or descending from Asia ** Asian culture, the culture of the people from Asia ** Asian cuisine, food based on the style of food of the people from Asi ...

, and 0.93% from two or more races. 0.34% of the population were

Hispanic The term ''Hispanic'' ( es, hispano) refers to people, Spanish culture, cultures, or countries related to Spain, the Spanish language, or Hispanidad. The term commonly applies to countries with a cultural and historical link to Spain and to Vic ...

Latino Latino or Latinos most often refers to: * Latino (demonym), a term used in the United States for people with cultural ties to Latin America * Hispanic and Latino Americans in the United States * The people or cultures of Latin America; ** Latin A ...

of any race. There were 409 households, out of which 37.7% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 34.7% were

married couples Marriage, also called matrimony or wedlock, is a culturally and often legally recognized union between people called spouses. It establishes rights and obligations between them, as well as between them and their children, and between t ...

living together, 33.5% had a female householder with no husband present, and 28.1% were non-families. 27.1% of all households were made up of individuals, and 10.5% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.80 and the average family size was 3.45. In the town, the population was spread out, with 32.7% under the age of 18, 11.8% from 18 to 24, 25.1% from 25 to 44, 17.8% from 45 to 64, and 12.6% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 30 years. For every 100 females, there were 88.0 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 81.7 males. The median income for a household in the town was $19,554, and the median income for a family was $22,788. Males had a median income of $22,396 versus $20,417 for females. The

per capita income Per capita income (PCI) or total income measures the average income earned per person in a given area (city, region, country, etc.) in a specified year. It is calculated by dividing the area's total income by its total population. Per capita i ...

for the town was $9,556. About 35.2% of families and 35.8% of the population were below the

poverty line The poverty threshold, poverty limit, poverty line or breadline is the minimum level of income deemed adequate in a particular country. The poverty line is usually calculated by estimating the total cost of one year's worth of necessities for t ...

, including 42.3% of those under age 18 and 28.1% of those age 65 or over.

Education

Central High School, formerly Lowndes County Training School, is in Hayneville. Alumni include the

Negro league The Negro leagues were United States professional baseball leagues comprising teams of African Americans and, to a lesser extent, Latin Americans. The term may be used broadly to include professional black teams outside the leagues and it may be ...

and

Major League Baseball Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball organization and the oldest major professional sports league in the world. MLB is composed of 30 total teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (AL), ...

player Billy Parker, civil rights activist

Catherine Coleman Flowers Catherine Coleman Flowers (born 1958) is an American environmental health researcher, writer and the founder of the Center for Rural Enterprise and Environmental Justice. She was selected as a MacArthur Fellow in 2020. Her first book, ''Waste: O ...

, and professional basketball player Ben Wallace.

Notable people

* Billy Parker (1942 - 2003), former

player * Ruth Reese (1921-1990), Civil rights activist and singer * Ben Wallace, former

NBA The National Basketball Association (NBA) is a professional basketball league in North America. The league is composed of 30 teams (29 in the United States and 1 in Canada) and is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United St ...

player * Kelvin Lawrence, politician

Gallery

File:Lowndes County Courthouse.jpg, Lowndes County courthouse in Hayneville. File:Hayneville, Alabama Town Hall.JPG, Hayneville Town Hall and Fire Department File:Hayneville, Alabama Post Office 36040.JPG, Hayneville Post Office ( ZIP Code: 36040)

References

External links

{{authority control Towns in Lowndes County, Alabama Towns in Alabama County seats in Alabama Montgomery metropolitan area