Lawyer and politician William Phineas Browne (1804-1869) was also an Alabama coal industry pioneer. In 1851, Browne established mining operations near Montevallo and by the late 1850s was delivering coal in the thousands of tons. He also built the Little Cahaba Iron Works, an iron-processing blast furnace and forge, on the Little Cahaba River.
William Phineas Browne
Courtesy of Alabama Department of Archives and History
