BESSEMER, a city of Jefferson county, Ala., U.S.A., um. S.W. of Birmingham, in the centre of the iron, coal and limestone region of the State. It is served by the Atlanta, Birmingham and Atlantic, the Birmingham Southern, the Frisco, the Illinois Cen tral, the Louisville and Nashville, the Seaboard Air Line, and the Southern railways. The population in 1920 was 18,674, of whom considerably more than half (10,561) were negroes; and after annexation of new territory, 1930, was 20,721 Federal census. It is a part of the Birmingham workshop and has large iron and steel industries and coal-mining operations, and also manufac tures fertilizers, brick, coal-tar derivatives and high explosives. There are about 2,600 persons on the industrial pay-roll of $3, 000,000. Bessemer was laid out in 1887, incorporated in 1888, and had a population of 4,544 at the 1890 census. It was named after Sir Henry Bessemer.