Alabama's tourist attractions draw from all eras of the state's
history. Mobile antebellum homes reflect Spanish, French or
English architectural influences, depending on which European
colonial power held sway over the area at the time of
construction. Huntsville, where rocket research was conducted
during WWII, and which has subsequently become a center of NASA
activity -- Alabama's citizens built the Apollo 11 spaceship
that landed on the moon -- is the site of the US Space Camp. The
limestone caverns of Russell Cave National Monument were
inhabited as early as 10,000 BCE and the beaches of Alabama's
Gulf Coast Region were formed millions of years ago. Alabama's
modern capital, Montgomery, was the capital of the Confederacy
during the Civil War era. Nearly a century later, Rosa Parks
refused to yield her seat on a Montgomery public bus and the
ensuing bus boycott was led by Martin Luther King Jr. in one of
his first high profile Civil Rights activities. Today, there are
museums and historical sites through