Anyone who has ever taken a walk in the woods in north Georgia knows that the Chattahoochee National Forest is one of the state’s great treasures. But it wasn’t always so. At the turn of the 20th century, the forest had been abused and overused, the victims of hydraulic mining, overcutting and poor land and […]
For those who like making continuous left-hand turns, it’s the place to be. One of the oldest stops on the NASCAR circuit, the Atlanta Motor Speedway, held its first race on this day in 1960. A crowd of 25,000 watched Glenn “Fireball” Roberts ride to victory lane. The racetrack was built in the wake of […]
He is the first African-American to play Othello in a major movie, following in the footsteps of Lawrence Olivier and Orson Welles. Laurence Fishburne was born in Augusta in 1961. His mother moved the family to Brooklyn, where Fishburne grew up. He’s been acting almost all his life, beginning with the soap opera One Life […]
The good work of Habitat for Humanity can be traced back to a progressive religious leader born on this day in 1912. Clarence Jordan was born in Talbotton. After studying agriculture at the University of Georgia, he became an ordained Baptist minister. Believing that God regarded people of all races as equals, Jordan combined his […]
Leo Frank went on trial for his life on this day in 1913. Frank, a New York Jew, was manager of the National Pencil Factory in Atlanta, accused of raping and murdering a 13-year-old employee named Mary Phagan. He was the last person to acknowledge having seen Phagan alive, and police arrested him despite strong […]
He is the namesake of the most prestigious prize in journalism. George Foster Peabody was born in Columbus in 1852. His parents were New Englanders. They moved to New York after the Civil War, when George was 14. Peabody had a natural aptitude for business and finance, and managed railroad accounts for a New York […]
In the 1820s, the Cherokee nation was carving out a permanent, sovereign home within the United States. Using Sequoyah’s Cherokee syllabary, the tribe could boast almost total literacy. Written laws led to the formation of a Cherokee Supreme Court. New Echota, near present day Calhoun, was established as the authorized capital of the Cherokee nation, […]
Baseball fans, how about this for an outfield trio? Hank Aaron, Willie Mays and Willie Stargell. That’s who started for the National League in the first All-Star Game ever played in Atlanta at the old Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium on this day in 1972. Although the Braves had hosted the mid-summer classic two times before- once […]
The Butler did it: a familiar phrase when Kevin Butler was kicking footballs. Butler was born in Savannah in 1962 and attended Redan High School in Stone Mountain, where he was a four-year letterman in both football and soccer. As a two-time football All American at the University of Georgia, Butler kicked the Dawgs to […]
John Smoltz was a major part of the Atlanta Braves championship teams of the 1990s. Smoltz was born in Michigan in 1967. His favorite team, the Detroit Tigers, drafted him in 1985 but traded him to the Braves two years later, a move they’d regret many times. For 21 seasons, he was one of the […]
