Cherokee County AlArchives Biographies.....Lawrence, Robert November 15 1849 - living in 1893
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Ann Anderson alabammygrammy@aol.com May 15, 2004, 6:09 pm

Author: Brant & Fuller (1893)
    ROBERT LAWRENCE, of Cedar Bluff, Ala., and next to . the youngest of the
family of fourteen children born to James and Chelnessa Lawrence, is a native of
Cherokee county, Ala., born November 15. 1849. Notwithstanding the fact that his
early educational training was interfered with by the outbreaking of the late
war, he succeeded in acquiring a fair share of general knowledge. He began his
business career in 1870 by starting, in company with his brother, a merchantile
establishment in Cedar Bluff, which was carried on under the firm name of W. H.
Lawrence & Co. until 1879, when the partnership was dissolved and Robert engaged
in farming for two years. In 1875, in company with R. A. Russell, he again
embarked in merchandising, under the firm title of R. Lawrence & Co., and with
various changes of title, he still continues most prosperously in the business -
Mr. J. F. Burnett having succeeded Mr. Russell in 1880 and retiring in 1886,
since when Mr. Lawrence has done business on his sole account. He carried a
general stock of an average of $5,000 and does an annual trade amounting to
$20,000. He is also interested in farming land, 450 acres of which he rents out.
He is full of enterprise and fully awake in increasing the prosperity of his
town and county. In 1888 he was vice-president of the North Georgia and Alabama
exposition, held at Rome, Ga. He himself worked up the exhibit for Cherokee
county, of which he made a grand success, taking a number of valuable
premiums.To quote from a report published by the exhibitors : "The magnificent
exhibit, especially of minerals and woods, from Cherokee county, Ala., attest
the activity of Mr. Lawrence and his colleagues in trying to present his county
to the world in its proper light." April 8, 1889, Mr. Lawrence, with others,
organized the Cedar Bluff Land, Mining & Manufacturing company, with a capital
stock of $200,000, the object of the company being the building up of Cedar
Bluff and the development of the mineral resources of northern Cherokee county.
In November, 1889, Mr. Lawrence took another active step toward bringing before
the public the advantages of his county and town, purchasing at that time the
Telephone, a Cedar Bluff journal, as a medium through which to proclaim the
merits of the section. The following year he christened the paper The Industrial
Free Press, and it now has a circulation of 600 copies. The policy of the paper
has been such as to incur the enmity of the alliance leaders-nevertheless it is
a flourishing newspaper. Mr. Lawrence was married May 27, 1884, to Mrs. M. F.
Lawrence, nee Watt, and is now the happy father of one child - Theodore Robert.
He and his wife are members of the Missionary Baptist church, in which both take
a deep interest. In politics, Mr. Lawrence is a straightout democrat, is a
non-residing member of the New York Reform club, was for several years an active
member of the Cherokee county democratic executive committee, and is altogether
a diligent worker in the party's interests.



Additional Comments:
from "Memorial Record of Alabama", Vol. I, p. 638-639

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