B. B. Comer

Who was B. B. Comer?

Braxton Bragg Comer was a planter, businessman, and an American Democratic politician who was the 33rd Governor of Alabama from 1907 to 1911, and a United States Senator in 1920. As governor, he achieved railroad reform, lowering rates for businesses in Alabama to make them more competitive with other states. He increased funding for the public school system, resulting in more rural schools and high schools in each county for white students, and eventually a rise in the state's literacy rate.

In addition to interests in the Comer family's 30,000-acre plantation, devoted to corn and cotton production, he had an interest in the Comer mines near Birmingham known as the Eureka Mines. In 1897 he invested $10,000 with the Trainer family, who intended to develop textile mills in the state, and he was appointed president of Avondale Mills, which he developed in Birmingham, serving in that role until his death in 1927.