Brighton: A Streetcar Suburb Tied to Iron

Brighton took its name from the famous English seaside resort, but there was nothing leisurely about its origins. The town took shape along a new dummy line, a small steam commuter railroad, that the Bessemer and Birmingham Railroad built in eighteen eighty-nine between those two industrial cities. Developers sold lots along the route starting in eighteen ninety-two, and by nineteen oh one about one hundred families had moved in.

The real anchor of Brighton was the Woodward Iron Company, one of the great industrial enterprises of Jefferson County. As long as Woodward was running, Brighton was running. When the company shut down in nineteen seventy-nine, it hit the town like a hammer. Residents left, businesses closed, and Brighton has spent decades since trying to rebuild what the closure took away. The story of Brighton is the story of dozens of small industrial communities in the Birmingham district: born around a single employer, and tested hard when that employer was gone.