07/12/2026
The Twickenham Historic District in Huntsville is the largest antebellum residential historic district in the state of Alabama, and it sits within easy walking distance of a city that also contains the most concentration of Ph.D. holders per capita in the United States and some of the most advanced aerospace engineering facilities in the country. Huntsville holds both of these things at the same time without any apparent contradiction.
The streets of Twickenham are lined with Federal and Greek Revival homes built in the early and mid-1800s, shaded by water oaks that have been growing since before the Civil War. The sidewalks are brick. The scale is unhurried. A neighborhood like this in a northern city would be heavily commercialized and well-known nationally. In Huntsville it is simply where people live, quietly, in very old houses.
Alabama has always been good at existing at multiple speeds simultaneously, and Huntsville is one of the best examples of that quality. Future-facing and historically grounded. Rocket science and 200-year-old porches.
