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The Great Atlanta Fire of 1917 began just after noon on 21 May 1917 in the Old Fourth Ward of Atlanta, Georgia. [1] It is unclear just how the fire started, but it was fueled by hot temperatures and strong winds which propelled the fire. [1] The fire, which burned for nearly 10 hours, destroyed 300 acres (120 ha) and 1,900 structures displacing over 10,000 people. Damages were estimated at $5 million, ($100 million in 2023). [1]
It was a clear, warm and sunny day with a brisk breeze from the south. This was not the only fire of the day, but the fourth call in the span of an hour: a small fire at the Candler Warehouse at 11:39 AM and at 11:43 a fire seven blocks north that destroyed three houses; and at 12:15, south of the Georgia Railroad from the big fire, ten homes were destroyed before being extinguished.
At 12:46 a call came from a small warehouse just north of Decatur Street between Fort and Hilliard, and the crew sent to inspect it found a stack of burning mattresses, but had no firefighting equipment with them. If the fire department had not been spread across so many different parts of the city already, the fire would have been put out there. By the time reinforcements arrived, it was quickly leaping north.[ citation needed ]
The fire spread quickly up to Edgewood Avenue and from there throughout the main residential areas of Sweet Auburn, sparing little. The area between Decatur and Edgewood was crammed with shanties and lean-tos, which provided fuel for the fire to grow very strong and move fast through the area.
A corridor was burned due north between Jackson (now Parkway and Charles Allen) and Boulevard, with a few prominent bulges at Highland and just south of Ponce de Leon Avenue. At Houston Street, the fire was still being stopped on the east by Boulevard (just sparing John Wesley Dobbs' block). When the fire reached Highland, it raced both east and west through many fine homes. Around 4:00 in the afternoon, fire-fighters had begun to stall the fire by using dynamite to destroy many homes along Pine, Boulevard and finally Ponce de Leon.
By nightfall the fire crossed Ponce de Leon. While reduced, it headed north through the recently built-out neighborhood along St. Charles, Vedado Way and Greenwood Avenue. It finally stopped at 10 PM, more than 1 mile (1.6 km) north of where it began.
In eleven hours, 22,000,000 US gallons (83,000,000 l; 18,000,000 imp gal) of water were pumped to put out the fire. Additional fire trucks had been sent from nine Georgia towns (as far away as Macon and Augusta), as well as from Chattanooga and Knoxville in Tennessee. 1,938 buildings were destroyed over 300 acres (1.2 km2) spanning 73 city blocks. Fires smoldered for the rest of the week.
Since more than 85% of the destroyed buildings had wood shingles, the city quickly passed an ordinance banning them for new construction. By 1931 all older buildings had replaced the wood shingles. In the history of the city, only Sherman's fire of 1864 did more extensive damage.
Rebuilding was sporadic, with large swaths kept open for years. Commercial strips were quickly built on the destroyed portions of Edgewood and Auburn where busy streetcar routes ran: 17 and 3 respectively. Where large estates with spacious front yards had been, along the entire stretch of Boulevard up to Ponce, dozens of two- and three-storey apartment buildings that hugged the sidewalk were built. Large open spaces were left at what is now the King Memorial and at Bedford-Pine Park, now named Central Park (host of Music Midtown in the 2000s).
Low-income housing developments were built in the destroyed extreme southern section and the areas south of North Avenue. Some 50 acres (200,000 m2) around Boulevard and Highland were eventually developed as the campus for Atlanta Medical Center. Except for where single family homes were quickly rebuilt north of Ponce de Leon, the character of this large area of Atlanta was changed forever. The next U.S. fire of more significance wouldn't occur for more than 70 years: The Oakland Hills firestorm of 1991.
Druid Hills is a community which includes both a census-designated place (CDP) in unincorporated DeKalb County, Georgia, United States, as well as a neighborhood of the city of Atlanta. The CDP's population was 14,568 at the 2010 census. The CDP formerly contained the main campus of Emory University and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) however they were annexed by Atlanta in 2018. The Atlanta-city section of Druid Hills is one of Atlanta's most affluent neighborhoods with a mean household income in excess of $238,500.
The Sweet Auburn Historic District is a historic African-American neighborhood along and surrounding Auburn Avenue, east of downtown Atlanta, Georgia, United States. The name Sweet Auburn was coined by John Wesley Dobbs, referring to the "richest Negro street in the world," one of the largest concentrations of African-American businesses in the United States.
Virginia–Highland is an affluent neighborhood of Atlanta, Georgia, founded in the early 20th century as a streetcar suburb. It is named after the intersection of Virginia Avenue and North Highland Avenue, the heart of its trendy retail district at the center of the neighborhood. The neighborhood is famous for its bungalows and other historic houses from the 1910s to the 1930s. It has become a destination for people across Atlanta with its eclectic mix of restaurants, bars, and shops as well as for the Summerfest festival, annual Tour of Homes and other events.
Oakhurst is a historic neighborhood in the southwest corner of Decatur, Georgia, a suburb of Atlanta, Georgia. It is located south of downtown Decatur and approximately six miles east of downtown Atlanta. Oakhurst primarily consists of residences built in early 20th century and neighborhood businesses. It is roughly bounded by the City of Atlanta's Kirkwood neighborhood on the west ; the Atlanta city limits on the south; West College Ave. on the north; and South McDonough St. on the east. There is also a neighborhood near the College Heights Early Learning Center referred to as "College Heights", but it is part of Historic Oakhurst.
East Lake is a transit station in Atlanta and Decatur, Georgia, serving the Blue Line of the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority (MARTA) rail system. It has a track in each direction serving an island platform. When the station entered service on June 30, 1979, the opening ceremony took place in the south parking lot.
Freedom Park is one of the largest city parks in Atlanta, Georgia, United States. The park forms a cross shape with the axes crossing at the Carter Center. The park stretches west-east from Parkway Drive, just west of Boulevard, to the intersection with the north-south BeltLine Eastside Trail, to Candler Park, and north-south from Ponce de Leon Avenue to the Inman Park/Reynoldstown MARTA station.
The Old Fourth Ward, often abbreviated O4W, is an intown neighborhood on the eastside of Atlanta, Georgia, United States. The neighborhood is best known as the location of the Martin Luther King Jr. historic site.
Ponce de Leon Avenue, often simply called Ponce, provides a link between Atlanta, Decatur, Clarkston, and Stone Mountain, Georgia. It was named for Ponce de Leon Springs, in turn from explorer Juan Ponce de León, but is not pronounced as in Spanish. Several grand and historic buildings are located on the avenue.
North Avenue is a major avenue in Atlanta, Georgia that divides Downtown Atlanta from Midtown Atlanta. North Avenue stretches continuously in Atlanta from Candler Park in the east, across Interstate 75 & Interstate 85, along the southern boundary of the Georgia Institute of Technology, to Joseph E. Lowery Boulevard just southwest of Georgia Tech, where it ends. North Avenue passes through the neighborhoods of Poncey-Highland, Old Fourth Ward, and Midtown Atlanta.
Clairemont - Great Lakes is a historic neighborhood in the north central section of the Atlanta, Georgia suburb of Decatur. It primarily consists of residences and churches. However, there are businesses on West Ponce de Leon Avenue, in the southernmost section of the neighborhood. Its rough boundaries are Coventry Road, Ponce de Leon Avenue and Commerce Drive on the south; Church Street on the east; Scott Boulevard on the north; and Willow on the northeast. The section of Superior Avenue north of Scott Boulevard is also considered part of this neighborhood. Ridgeland Park, located northeast of the Clairemont - Great Lakes neighborhood, is not presently considered part of the neighborhood. It was developed later (1946–1950) and is in unincorporated DeKalb County. However, in 2008 the city of Decatur began evaluating annexation of this neighborhood, which is contiguous to the rest of the development.
Adair Park is a historic and contemporary community in the west section of the Atlanta, Georgia suburb of Decatur. It is one of Decatur’s most diverse communities in terms of building types, and includes several individual neighborhoods. Adair Park has single family residences, townhomes, cluster homes, institutional buildings and commercial buildings – built from the early 1900s to 2008. Its rough boundaries are: downtown Decatur to the east; Ponce de Leon Avenue to the north; Howard Avenue and the railroad tracks to the south; and the Parkwood neighborhood to the west. There is also an Adair Park in southwest Atlanta, but it is not part of the Decatur community.
The Nine-Mile Circle was a streetcar line of the Atlanta Street Railway, later the Atlanta Consolidated Street Railway which went from downtown Atlanta to today's Virginia-Highland neighborhood as follows:
Streetcars originally operated in Atlanta downtown and into the surrounding areas from 1871 until the final line's closure in 1949.
In Atlanta, Georgia, trolleybuses, generally called trackless trolleys there, were a major component of the public transportation system in the middle decades of the 20th century, carrying some 80 percent of all transit riders during the period when the system was at its maximum size. At the end of 1949 Atlanta had a fleet of 453 trolleybuses, the largest in the United States, and it retained this distinction until 1952, when it was surpassed by Chicago.
Briarcliff Plaza, also known as Ponce de Leon Plaza, is a strip mall-type shopping center designed by architect George Harwell Bond and opened in 1939 at the southwest corner of Ponce de Leon Avenue and Highland Avenue in the Poncey-Highland neighborhood of Atlanta. Braircliff Plaza was developed by Relnac Inc., and was proposed to cost $300,000. Construction began after the last home on the block was purchased by Relnac Inc., the Dr. Robin Adair estate, and Briarcliff Plaza opened throughout 1939 with businesses such as Dupree Dry Cleaners, Blick’s Bowling Alley, Holcomb Flowers, the Georgia Fruit & Vegetable Company and Nick Caruso’s Big Place which offered shoe repair, hat cleaning, pressing, repairing and hat cleaning. It was Atlanta's first shopping center with off-street parking. It is anchored by the historic Plaza Theatre and Urban Outfitters. A portion of the historic plaza area was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2020.
There have been multiple freeway revolts in Atlanta, Georgia. The longest and most famous examples of Interstate opposition were against I-485 and the Stone Mountain Freeway through Intown Atlanta, lasting over 30 years, from the early 1960s until the final construction of Freedom Parkway on a small portion of the contested routes in 1994.
The History of Virginia–Highland, the Intown Atlanta neighborhood, dates back to 1812, when William Zachary bought and built a farm on 202.5 acres (0.819 km2) of land there. At some point between 1888 and 1890 the Nine-Mile Circle streetcar arrived,, making a loop of what are now Ponce de Leon Avenue, North Highland Avenue, Virginia Avenue, and Monroe Drive. Atlantans at first used the line to visit what was then countryside, including Ponce de Leon Springs, but the line also enabled later development in the area. Residential development began as early as 1893 on St. Charles and Greenwood Avenues, must most development took place from 1909 through 1926 — solidly upper-middle class neighborhoods, kept all-white by covenant.
The Atlanta neighborhood of Virginia–Highland is one of many intown Atlanta neighborhoods characterized by commercial space of two sorts:
Grace United Methodist Church is a Methodist church in Atlanta, Georgia, United States. Originally organized as a mission in 1871, the current church building was designed by Francis Palmer Smith and was completed in 1923.