Piedmont Park
| January 4, 1887 |
Piedmont Driving Club (horses, not cars) in Atlanta is formed by 100 white men (a requirement to join the club)
|
| |
Piedmont Park |
| April 9, 1887 |
Piedmont Exposition is officially proposed
|
| |
Piedmont Park |
| April 14, 1887 |
The Gentlemen's Driving Club agrees that "Doc" Walker's estate is the future home of the club |
| |
Piedmont Park |
| October 8, 1887 |
Piedmont Park opens (for whites only)
|
| |
Piedmont Park |
| October 10, 1887 |
The Piedmont Exposition opens
|
| |
Piedmont Park |
| October 17, 1887 |
U. S. President Grover Cleveland visits the Piedmont Exposition in Atlanta
|
| |
Piedmont Park |
| February 10, 1892 |
First football game in the state is played at Piedmont Park, Atlanta, between the "state university" and Auburn
|
| |
Piedmont Park |
| September 18, 1895 |
Booker T. Washington makes his famous "Atlanta Compromise" speech at the opening of the 1895 Piedmont Cotton Exposition (Atlanta).
|
| |
Piedmont Park |
| October 8, 1895 |
The Liberty Bell arrives from Philadelphia to be displayed at Atlanta's Piedmont Cotton Exposition
|
| |
Piedmont Park |
| October 15, 1895 |
Two inventors, C. Francis Jenkins and Thomas Armat demonstrate the "Phontoscope," a primative version of a motion picture projector at the Piedmont Exposition in Atlanta
|
| |
Piedmont Park |
| October 27, 1895 |
President Grover Cleveland visits the Piedmont Exposition (Atlanta)
|
| |
Piedmont Park |
| October 27, 1895 |
Buffalo Bill and his Wild West Show appears at the Piedmont Exposition
|
| |
Piedmont Park |
| December 31, 1895 |
Cotton Exposition closes after entertaining more than 800,000 people in just over 3 months.
|
| |
Piedmont Park |
| May 23, 1904 |
City council okays the purchase of Piedmont Park from the Piedmont Exposition Company. They pay $93,000 for roughly 185 acres.
|
| |
Piedmont Park |
| October 20, 1905 |
President Theodore Roosevelt visits Roswell (Roswell, Georgia history) and Atlanta (Atlanta, Georgia history). The President's train stopped at Chamblee (Roswell Station), where he boarded the train to Roswell. He crossed the Chattahoochee River and visited both Bulloch Hall and Roswell Square, where he made brief comments. Roosevelt then had lunch at the Piedmont Driving Club (now Piedmont Park) and spoke at Georgia Tech before leaving for Jacksonville, Florida later that evening.
|
| |
Atlanta, Georgia (1900-2000) |
| |
Piedmont Park |
| January 11, 1906 |
Fire destroys much of Piedmont Park, including part of the Piedmont Driving Club
|
| |
Piedmont Park |
| |
Atlanta, Georgia (1900-2000) |
| October 11, 1911 |
Allen G. Newman's Peace Monument, a symbol of the reconciliation that occurred between the North and the South is dedicated at Atlanta's Piedmont Park
|
| |
Atlanta, Georgia (1900-2000) |
| |
Piedmont Park |
| November 29, 1935 |
In Warm Springs for Thanksgiving, President Franklin D. Roosevelt stops in Atlanta on his return trip to Washington D. C., speaking at Techwood Homes, Atlanta University and Piedmont Park
|
| |
Franklin Delano Roosevelt |
| |
Piedmont Park |
| May 11, 1969 |
The Allman Brothers Band play at Piedmont Park
|
| |
Piedmont Park |
| September 10, 2003 |
Atlanta's Piedmont Park begins planning an expansion into 53 acres of undeveloped land the city purchased with the original park |
| |
Piedmont Park |
The story of Piedmont Park begins with Samuel Walker, an early settler who owned a tract of land north of Atlanta. He actually bought the land for $450 dollars in 1834 before Atlanta or Fulton County was formed. His son Benjamin "Doc" Walker built a home on Plaster Bridge Road in 1868. This home became the original Gentlemen's Driving Club organized by a group of well-known Atlantans headed by Henry Grady and Joel Hurt.
The group seriously considered 5 places around the city but settled on Walker's property for a variety of reasons, part of which included the relative ease it would require to create the track for driving horses. Among the noted names on the first list of members published in September, 1887 are George Adair, Rufus Bullock, J. D. Collins, C. A. Collier, Lauren De Give, Grady, W. A. Hemphill, Hurt, 4 members of the Inman family, E. W. Marsh, Hoke Smith, Jack Spalding, and Sam Venable.
After purchasing the land on July 1, 1887, the men leased the park to the Piedmont Exposition to develop large community events. Many of the 100 men were involved in both the driving club and the expositions.
|
