Archive | history RSS feed for this section

Congratulations, ladies

18 Aug

Maybe you didn’t hear that today is the 90th anniversary of the Nineteenth Amendment! And did you also know that Georgia didn’t ratify the amendment until 1970?? Georgia was actually the first state to reject the 19th amendment! Yes, we have always been trailblazers here. However, the amendment still became effective in 1920 when Tennessee was the 36th state (only the third Southern state) to ratify, so Georgia women were still able to vote prior to 1970. Still, Georgia law required that a voter be registered six months prior to an election, so women here couldn’t actually vote until the 1922 election. It’s so complicated for my feeble female mind!

The good news, sort of, for Atlanta ladies was that in 1919 they were allowed to vote in municipal primary elections. And what a glorious day it was for upstanding suffragists on that May day in 1919 when they took to the courthouse to register for the very first time.

The Atlanta Constitution, May 27, 1919

Yes, the subtitle here is “Basket of Roses and Daises Brought to the Tax Collector’s Office by One Woman to Give ‘That Feminine Touch’.”

(more…)

So much pulchritude in this Gate City

9 Aug

In case you are wondering why you look so radiant and lovely right now, it is due to three things: the devastating southern heat and humidity, the dwindling water resources brought to you via our crumbling sewer systems, and the excess of hair salons (which go up $10 in service prices every month it seems). At least this was the Atlanta Constitution‘s booster-ish theory in at 1926 article which detailed some of the most modern beauty treatments available to the city’s “many beautiful women” as well as its “lady strangers and visitors.”

June 17, 1926

When the paper wasn’t hyping Atlanta ladies’ aptitude for beauty via its editorial department, the advertisers were happy to point out some of the services and products available for female improvement.

(more…)

Animals are Atlantans too

12 Jul

Think about what it takes from the animal kingdom to impress us these days. We have to have a palatial aquarium and a constant stream of newborn pandas to keep us interested. It’s no wonder that we have orangutans dropping dead left and right and gorillas having rage black-outs everywhere. Primates used to be the toast of the town just a couple of decades ago! Now they have to play constant second fiddle to an animal for whom 99% of his diet is a highly-invasive species of grass.

Willie B. for Congress - Children with campaign posters

Look, I’ve wasted countless hours on Panda Cam like everyone else, but don’t you remember when animals at Zoo Atlanta were named after beloved mayors instead of names selected by fast food Asian restaurants, and when those animals at the zoo could actually launch a campaign for the United States House of Representatives?

Dog and man

But before even Willie B, Atlanta had a deep fondness for simpler creatures – dogs, cows, ponies. As recently as 1900 Atlanta was trying very hard to be sophisticated and forget its rough-and-tumble roots. This was just 20 or so years after the “cow ordinance” was perhaps comparable to “PARK Atlanta” in controversy and disdain, when the city tried to make it illegal for residents to let their cows graze wherever they liked. Can you imagine? The ordinance was approved, and then seen as bad for poor people and repealed, and finally adopted again and fully enforced. Our grizzly pioneer past was over and it was time to find new and fascinating ways for animals to stay involved in our daily lives with common livestock no longer running the business district.
(more…)

Improvements in pediatric care

11 Jul

Probably one of the most important advances to occur in medical care for children over the past fifty years is that it stopped being okay for this snarling, hollow-eyed nightmare creature to come visit kids in the hospital.
(more…)

Back to our regularly-scheduled poppycock

30 Jun

Atlanta Constitution, October 1, 1939

Did you know that Decatur was home to the original NIMBYs? Were it not for Decaturites’ resistance to change and progress, Atlanta would not have existed, because the railroad would have just located in Decatur’s backyard, instead of an arbitrary spot a few miles west that the General Assembly and the Western & Atlanta Railroad could agree to.

Decatur feared the unsavory flim-flam artists and grit and noise that accompany a rail hub, and they were 100% justified in their uneasiness because the area around Terminus became home to all kinds of criminals and immorality, and general filth – the reason Atlanta eventually decided to just elevate the city a couple of stories, creating our now-crumbling viaduct system/Underground Atlanta and raising Downtown above all the smoke and noise of the train traffic.

And to this day, the edgiest evening a Decatur resident can ask for is a night of racy improv comedy at Push Push Theater followed by a couple of imported high-gravity beers at Brick Store Pub. Maybe if things get really crazy you and your crowd of Presbyterian seminarians will get into a heated discussion over reform movements in the postmodern church, who knows! And this is exactly how Decatur likes it!

The point is, in the 1830s, Decatur was like, “No way, no sleazy railroad in our educated, cultured town!” Actually, they were more like:

Black and dusty;
Going to Augusty.
Black and dusty;
Going to Augusty -
And on and on to Augusty.

That was their battle cry! (“Augusty” = Augusta.) Decatur even got really serious later about building a wall between themselves and Atlanta (or whatever it was called then) to keep the pioneers and other riff-raff out, and to be sure the rapid expansion of Atlanta didn’t creep too close to Decatur. Atlanta’s sprawl has been threatening Georgia since the very beginning…

And yet this Atlanta Constitution article (click it above to enlarge) compares early Decatur residents’ wall proposition to – Nazis? The Ming Dynasty? In 1939 – really?

Previously: Breaking news! Atlanta’s seedy past!

The more things change…

25 Jun

Atlanta Constitution, April 18, 1893

This little editorial ran in the Atlanta Constitution the day after the city council adopted a resolution to change Wheat Street’s name to the “more pretentious” and “stylish” Auburn Avenue, at the request of the residents on the uptown end of the street.

Some council members also discussed changing the name of Peters Street on “a certain portion of the street” as “no respectable lady living on the street would give it as her address to a stranger” due to its infamy for housing a “disreputable class of people.”

Now, think about if Peachtree Street had been changed to Calhoun that long ago, as was proposed in this street-renaming frenzy of 1893! It would have altered the face of HISTORY.

See more street name changes here.

Picnic season and the original staycation

24 Jun

by Edwards & Sons, ca. 1890. via Atlanta History Center.

1882 really had the summer of picnics in Atlanta. The practice was popular before and after, of course, but never again as lovingly reported in the Atlanta Constitution as in ’82. Atlanta was surrounded on all sides by wilderness, except a little ways to the east where Decatur stood – but beyond that was Stone Mountain and other woodsy pleasures. The Ponce de Leon springs’ grand man-made amusements hadn’t been constructed yet, and I don’t even think that area was annexed to the city until a bit later. All the young people daytripped out to the countryside and river banks of the undeveloped northwest of the city, often to what was then called Iceville (named such because of its proximity to the Atlanta Brewing and Ice Company).

Unfortunately, food journalism wasn’t as popular as society gossip back in those days, so maybe we’ll never know what “nicnacks” they feasted on at the O.B. club or Turn Verein picnic parties. Perhaps oppossum in sweet potatoes?

Atlanta Constitution, May 7, 1882.

May 10, 1882

(more…)

More parking deck history

16 Jun

Geez, you guys are so unpredictable. I never would have imagined that a post about Atlanta’s first parking garage would have swept the local internet for like four hours as it did, but if that’s going to be the case then I will give the people more of what they want. At the end of the day, don’t we all just want approval from faceless strangers?

I know I said I would talk about metered parking because it is more germane, but it is actually really boring and predictable how it came to be in Atlanta. The downtown businesspeople and the Atlanta Motor Club didn’t want patrons and drivers to have to pay for on-street parking; the city wanted more order on the streets and every other city’s central business district was getting parking meters; &c., &c., &c.

Here are two more elegant garages that opened in 1928, each one better than the last. This was behind Rich’s department store at Forsyth Street and what is now MLK Drive.

Atlanta Constitution, April 15, 1928

This one opened behind the Glenn Building (now the Glenn Hotel) at Marietta and Spring streets. (Click to read the larger ad.) Check out the alert parking attendant’s jodhpurs.

Atlanta Constitution ad, November 1, 1928

In a May 6 article about the Glenn garage, T. L. B. Lyster, vice president and consulting engineer of the National Garages, Inc., Detroit, Mich., discusses the latest trends in downtown traffic solutions as he breezed into town to sign his company up to run the new garage:

(more…)

The inefficient manners and brilliant social life of the Atlanta gentleman

15 Jun

From the Atlanta Constitution‘s Real Estate Review, July 12, 1925:

ATLANTA MEN ARE INVOLUNTARILY COURTEOUS
Signs in elevators of the Hurt building request men to refrain from taking hats off in the elevators when women are in the car. This request is said to be in the interest of comfort and better service. Practically every man entering the cars reads the signs, but the writer has not seen one man observe the request. Men in Atlanta seem to be involuntarily courteous to women despite the statement that they are losing some of their chivalry since women began to work side by side with them down town. When a woman enters the elevator men reach for their hats just as naturally as they do when a woman bows to them on the street. After all, however, it seems to be an inconsistent situation. Men do not pull off their hats on street cars or in other public places simply because of the presence of a woman, and there seems to be no real reason why they should doff their hats in the elevators. There would be no more discourtesy in a man retaining the hat upon his head in an elevator than in a railway coach, a closed automobile or theater lobby. On the other hand, it is not only superfluous as a mark of chivalry, but is causes many hats to be crushed and takes up room in the car often times that could be put to better service.

This was actually printed in the newspaper!

But that’s not all Atlanta men were up to in 1925. Only the fanciest of these hat-tipping dandies were members of the Nine O’Clock German Club, or just “the Nine O’Clocks,” ” a social organization composed originally of young eligible bachelors.” (A german in this context is “an elaborate social dance resembling a cotillion.”)

Prior 1896, there were two bachelor camps – the the Nine O’Clocks and the ’94 German Club – but they merged to create a united front in wooing ladies at elaborate dances. This exclusive organization pre-dated the Capital City Club and the Piedmont Driving Club – the oldest social club in Atlanta, they hosted “the brightest gatherings of the season.”

At the Piedmont Driving Club, 1925. via Atlanta History Center.

(more…)

This week in history: Atlanta’s first parking deck

12 Jun

On June 3, 1925, the Ivy Street Garage – Atlanta’s first parking garage – opened! Called a “mammoth automobile hotel” by the Constitution, it was six stories, held 600 cars, and offered white-glove valet, car wash, and basic maintenance and repair services. The Ivy Street Garage was said to be “one of the largest and perhaps the most modern structures of its kind in the world.”

“It is in a central location and was erected, it was declared, to fill a growing need for downtown parking space in order that businessmen might have a place to leave their cars without the danger of being stolen or their owners being served with a summons to court for parking too long on the central business streets.” – The Atlanta Constitution, May 24, 1924

(more…)

Eat a peach

24 May

(via Travis Ekmark)

This was a real poster in the mid-80s! And the thing was, this campaign for Atlanta came at the end of a point in time (15 to 20 or so years) when New York more or less had already moved over. Have you seen After Hours or read Please Kill Me? Anything south of Wall Street was post-apocalyptic!

Seventies Streets Alive

23 May

In honor of the first Atlanta Streets Alive, kicking off in less than 2 hours in Woodruff Park, here are some photos of Bike Day, hosted by WQXI (now 790 the Zone). I think Bike Day was possibly in 1971, and the moment was definitely captured by Boyd Lewis.

(more…)

Plaza Drugs through the ages

22 Mar

via Atlanta Time Machine

According to the New Georgia Encyclopedia, Briarcliff Plaza was “Georgia’s first true shopping center.” Located at the corner of Ponce and N. Highland, it was the first retail space with an off-street parking lot in Atlanta in 1939.

In the 1960s, Plaza Drugs was a delightful place to buy Russell Stover chocolates, makeup, and mother’s little helpers.

(via Downhome Traces)

Of course, between being open 24 hours a day and Ponce de Leon Avenue’s departure from its genteel origins, Plaza Drugs’ scene changed with urban decline. You can see and read about Briarcliff Plaza social life in the very early ’80s in George Mitchell’s out-of-print Ponce de Leon: An Intimate Portrait of Atlanta’s Most Famous Avenue, which is worth every penny you have to pay for it.

In the mid-1980s, new wave kids The Plaza Drugs played at the 688 Club on Spring Street, and here on the American Music Show. They are so good! (more…)

Happy International Women’s Day, Atlanta!

8 Mar


From a May 8, 1913 Atlanta Constitution story about Georgia’s rapidly worsening “girl problem.”
Two year later, in 1915,* Agnes Scott College was established.

In the late 19th century, the Atlanta Constitution had this feature called “In the Interests of Woman” that included a great deal of lovely, boring anecdotes like, “The friends of Mrs. E.J. Harris, of Macon, will be pleased to know she is with her sister, Mrs. N.C. Spence, at 251 North Boulevard,” and, “Miss Eva Hodges returned yesterday after a delightful visit to her friend, Miss Pearl Bridges, at her beautiful home in Ellaville, Ga. She will now join her mother at their country home near Norcross.”

And to think people these days are like, “TWITTER IS SO SCARY!! I DON’T  WANT PEOPLE TO KNOW WHERE I AM AT ALL TIMES,” as though it is a new novel thing?

One thrilling thing I did learn from this section which was of interest to me as a woman was in a column titled “Trolley Parties the Rage” (August 6, 1895): (more…)

Housing boom

6 Mar


From The Atlanta Constitution, August 9, 1925. Full story here (PDF).

(Peachtree and 15th Street today.)

History in the making

26 Feb

I was looking over the Atlanta Preservation Center’s Phoenix Flies sched for March 6-22, making my wish list. Don’t be fooled upon first glance! It looks like a lot of stuff but it’s really just 27 tours of the Wren’s Nest WHICH THEY OFFER EVERY DAY ANYWAY. Just sayin’!

But you guys, is the Oakland Cemetery tour about fraternal organizations going to be as exciting as the 2000 feature film The Skulls, starring Joshua Jackson and Paul Walker? That’s all I want to know.

Bobby Kennedy in Atlanta

3 Feb

In 1963, with Vice Mayor Sam Massell:
(via the Atlanta History Center)

(via. Does anyone know where/when this might have been taken? I’m not yet convinced this was Atlanta.)

And lots of WSB-TV news clips at UGA’s Civil Rights Digital Library.

Selling out

20 Jan


I got lost in Duke University’s digital archives of American advertising. There are plenty of good things here! Related to Atlanta, of course. It’s hilarious how quaint and unsophisticated advertising was back in the day before sexy Don Draper told us cigarettes are healthy because they are toasted, or before Coca-Cola invented Santa Claus, you know? Now we have revolutionary ad campaigns like twelve years of cows who can’t spell and tell us to eat chicken – that’s both humorous and cutting edge!

Earlier I posted an ad from a 1910 program of Atlanta’s Grand Opera House (which, if I’m correct, later became Loew’s Grand Theatre and then even later became yet another victim of fire). There are so many more where that ad came from in this playbill! And also a list of characters in the performance, such as “The Senator’s Boys, Known About Town as ‘The Midnight Sons’–Dick, who plays with the ticker; Harry, who trifles with the Stage; Tom, who fusses with sport.” I would pay a lot of money (before my student discount) to find out more about the Midnight Sons! Hint, hint, Alliance Theatre. Here are some of the other businesses who bought space in the program. (Click anything for the larger version).

(more…)

Atlanta and the WPA

10 Jan

Walker Evans, "Houses and Billboards, Atlanta, 1936."

For the past week I’ve been looking through the Federal Writers’ Project life histories at the Library of Congress site. These narratives were gathered between 1936 and 1940 in most of  Georgia‘s major cities. Some are hilarious, some are sad, some are enlightening, some are all of the above. Specifically, I was reading those of Atlanta residents. Typically the WPA writer includes the street address of the person he or she is interviewing, so I’ve been Google Mapping to figure out if these homes still exist (they don’t).

In “I Got a Record,” Molly Kensey assumes the interviewer is coming to talk with her about Gone With the Wind, which was clearly the talk of the town. Journalists from all over were converging on Atlanta interested in the Civil War and Reconstruction, interviewing those who remembered it including African Americans who were not permitted to attend the premiere of the film.

You say you want me to talk to you ’bout the experiences uv my life, is this somethin’ ’bout ‘Gone With The Wind’? Oh, I thought maybe it was, I’ve heard so much ’bout the Premiere of ‘Gone With The Wind’ I jes’ know’d when you axed me to talk with you it was somethin’ ’bout that. Well, that’s alright, I wouldn’t have mind tellin’ you nohow ef it was, fer I got a record and I don’t mind tellin’ it to nobody.

(more…)

Atlanta Singles Celebrate! the Holidays

23 Dec

Being single around Atlanta during Christmastime is THE PITS. I don’t know this from personal experience, but I just scanned through the holiday issue of Atlanta Singles Celebrate! (from 1989) and now I know that being alone in the month of December is the most degrading, lonely time of self-doubt and miserable gifts with hidden meaning.

(more…)

← Older Entries
Newer Entries →

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 74 other followers