The pictures in this album are snapshots taken by H.H. Foreman, section hand and section foreman, ranging from the 1920’s to the 1960’s, primarily on the Western Railway of Alabama, with a few of the earliest ones on the Atlantic Coast Line.
BIOGRAPHY OF HENRY HOUSTON FOREMAN
Henry Houston "HH" Foreman was born in Center Ridge, Alabama May 26, 1901. Houston’s father, George V. Foreman, worked for the Atlantic Coastline Railroad. When Houston was 3 years old his family moved to Florida where his dad worked for a lumber company maintaining their logging railroad. The family remained in Florida until Houston’s father died September 13, 1912. The family then moved back to Center Ridge, Alabama.
Houston started to work on the Atlantic Coastline Railroad around June 1923 and worked as a section hand in the Dillard, Alabama area until May 9, 1925. Houston started to work with the Western Railway of Alabama on May 11, 1925 as a section hand. Later he was promoted to section foreman and worked many different sections of the WofA and A&WP railroads. In the early 1960s all sections were eliminated and two "extra gangs" were established to cover the entire railroad’s track maintenance. Houston had seniority and took the foreman’s job on the division from Selma, Alabama to Auburn, Alabama. Before his retirement in 1966, Houston worked a period of time on the other division from Auburn, Alabama to beyond Atlanta, Georgia.
Houston and his wife Myrtle had ten children and twenty-three grandchildren. Houston enjoyed drawing and after his retirement, started doing chalk drawings and scriptural chalk talks. He also kept a large garden and enjoyed sharing his vegetables with his family and neighbors.
Houston died of cancer on February 6, 1986, in Opelika, Alabama where he is buried.
