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Farming For A Better Future, page 181
Robert B. Buckingham (1873-1940) was the son of farmers John (1850-aft. 1880) and Julia Buckingham (1853-aft. 1880) of Oakland, Lauderdale County. Mr. Buckingham owned a grocery store in the 1910s. According to the 1913 Florence City Directory, Mr. Buckingham's store was located at 408 East Alabama. The 1920 census lists Robert Buckingham as a merchant of a retail grocery and his wife, Helen (or Hellon), worked as a salesman at, presumably, the same grocery store. In the 1920 city directory, the grocery was located at 308 E Alabama Street, but this is most likely a change in the street numbers and not an actual change in location. It is unknown what became of Buckingham after 1921 when his wife passed away. Her September 16, 1921 obituary says that Robert was “a colored merchant, and one of the best known and most respected colored men of the city.” They are both buried at the Florence City Cemetery.
According to the 1913 Florence City Directory, Lewellyn Brewer (c.1860-1865-after 1940) had a grocery at 508 East Alabama Street near Buckingham's Grocery. Brewer is recorded on the 1920 census as a merchant/retail grocer, still living on Alabama Street. Mr. Brewer and his
family relocated to Los Angeles, California by 1940.
(Top) 1920 Census Record for Robert Buckingham (National Archives
and Records Administration via
Ancestry.com) (Middle) 1920 Census Record for Llewellyn
Brewer in Florence, Lauderdale
County, Alabama (National Archives
and Records Administration via
Ancestry.com) (Bottom) 1940 Census Record for Llewellyn Brewer in Los Angeles, California (National Archives and Records Administration via Ancestry.com)
Jacob “Jake” W. Wytch (c.1852-1927) was born in North Carolina before the Civil War. By the 1880s, it appears that Wytch had made his way to Texas, before coming back east and settling in Florence. He was both a boot and shoemaker and a grocer. Documents suggest he either traded
off these professions as needed or conducted them simultaneously. Mr.
Wytch may have been a shoemaker first with a shop on Court Street in
1880, located above a store. In 1897, Mr. Wytch was Worshipful Master of Centennial Lodge No. 19 of the Colored Mason. He also owned a grocery first located on Court Street. The 1910 census records Wytch and his wife, Charlotte living on Alabama Street and a grocer. He moved the store in 1913 to 108 East Mobile Street in 1913 and his family to a house at 204 South Pine Street. The 1926 Florence City Directory lists Wytch as a shoe repairer living in a house at 255 Spring Road. He would have been nearly 75 years old and passed away that year or the next. His
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