The Georgia Trust for Historic Preservation released today its 2013 list of ten Places in Peril in the state. Places in Peril is designed to raise awareness about Georgia’s significant historic, archaeological and cultural resources, including buildings, structures, districts, archaeological sites and cultural landscapes that are threatened by demolition, neglect, lack of maintenance, inappropriate development or insensitive public policy.
Two local sites of concern to Intown residents:
Candler Park Golf Course
Coca-Cola founder Asa Candler donated 55 acres of land in northeast Atlanta to be used as a public park by the city in 1922. The land included a nine-hole golf course designed by landscape architect Helen Smith. Smith was hired by Candler to design the course for his daughter because women were prohibited from playing on the Druid Hills course that Candler frequented. In recent years, the city has leased operations of the golf course to a managing company; however, with low revenue and dwindling use, Atlanta’s Department of Parks is considering closing the historic golf course.
Sweet Auburn Commercial District
The birthplace of the Civil Rights movement, Sweet Auburn was once a thriving community that exemplified African American success in the South. Its businesses, congregations and social organizations provided a refuge for many black Atlantans. Though recent rehabilitation efforts in adjacent residential neighborhoods have been successful, the effect of hard economic times has continued to plague the commercial district, leaving many significant buildings vacant and vulnerable to demolition or incompatible redevelopment. After being added to the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s 11 Most Endangered Historic Places list in 1992 and The Georgia Trust’s Places in Peril list in 2006, both organizations re-listed Sweet Auburn in 2012 and have agreed to work with the City of Atlanta and the Historic District Development Committee to revitalize the Sweet Auburn Commercial District.
Other sites on the list include: Tift Warehouse in Albany; Dobbins Mining Landscape and Stilesboro Academy in Bartow County; Cave Spring Log Cabin in Floyd County; Monticello Commercial Building in Jasper County; Lexington Presbyterian Church in Oglethorpe County; Hancock County Courthouse in Sparta; and Traveler’s Rest State Historic Site in Toccoa.
