Gary Hodges, a social media historian, is preserving and sharing Jasper and Walker County’s history one Facebook post at a time.
Hodges, whose Facebook page is “Jasper & Walker County, Alabama Photos” says that he has always been interested in history.
“I find it interesting, reading and searching out historical facts,” Hodges said. He reminisced about looking at prints of old photos in the newspaper when he was growing up, and about teachers who influenced him towards the path of public history.
“Ruth E. Romine Teaford’s researching local history influenced me, and Winfred Sandlin, history teacher at Walker College,” he said.
Hodges can point to one event that inspired him to start his Facebook page. “When Pat Morrison, who is father-in-law to one of my nieces, put out Postcard History: Walker County, Alabama,” he said, the idea for a Facebook page sharing local history was born.
“I thought others might enjoy seeing old photos of Jasper,” Hodges said.
As he went through his large amount of old photos, Hodges realized that his collection covered not just Jasper, but Walker County as a whole. This led him to expand his scope.
Hodges was not expecting his project to gain as much attention as it has.
“I never thought this page would have generated the interest it has now,” he said, before discussing analytics and audience numbers. “I would guess, right now, more than 20,000 people enjoy seeing old photos I post.”
With such a large audience, people began to ask questions about the photos and local history. Hodges is happy to supply facts and information to all who ask.
“When photos don’t have names, location, time and info noted on them, that information is lost when people with knowledge of the history behind them die,” Hodges said.
Hodges now runs four Facebook pages sharing information to his eager audience, including a very popular page titled “Roll Tide Roll Tide Fans,” which has an audience of over 50,000 people.
“History needs to be preserved and not lost or erased or altered,” Hodges said. “What better way to do this than having this Facebook page?”
