Southern Alabama
- memorably depicted in Harper Lee's child's-eye view of racial conflict,
To Kill a Mockingbird
- still consists mostly of small, sleepy, God-fearing rural communities. Only state capital
Montgomery
, with a popu lation of just over 200,000, achieves metropolitan status. It lies in the heart of the
Black Belt
, originally named for the rich loamy soil, but these days more usually taken to refer to the region's ethnic make-up. Cotton was the major earner here until the boll weevil infestation of 1915. Now it has been supplanted (officially) by soybeans, corn and peanuts - though surveys suggest that the leading cash crop is, in fact, marijuana.
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