1. On September 17, 1861, the Battle of Chickamauga began in northwestern Georgia. Though not fought in Alabama, the battle involved Confederate forces from Alabama and was one of the bloodiest battles of the Civil War.

2. On September 17, 1919, a group of African American soldiers stationed at Fort Benning, Georgia, were accused of attacking and robbing two women in nearby Phenix City, Alabama. Thirteen soldiers were arrested and court-martialed, and six were hanged in what became known as the "Campbell lynching."

3. On September 17, 1954, the poet and novelist Harper Lee wrote a letter to her agent, expressing her excitement about a manuscript she had just finished. That manuscript would become the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel To Kill a Mockingbird, set in fictional Maycomb, Alabama.

4. On September 17, 1974, the Alabama Board of Education granted a charter to the state's first charter school, Alabama School of Fine Arts in Birmingham. Today, the school remains a prestigious institution for talented and gifted students in Alabama and beyond.

5. On September 17, 2015, Alabama Governor Robert Bentley resigned from office amid a scandal involving allegations of an affair with a top aide and misuse of state resources. Bentley was succeeded by Lieutenant Governor Kay Ivey, who later became Alabama's first female governor to be elected to the office.