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Contact Us
Piedmont Park Conservancy
P.O. Box 7795
Atlanta, GA 30357-0795
404.875.7275 (PARK)
404.875.0530 (fax)
info@piedmontpark.org
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In
1887, the Gentlemen’s Driving Club purchased 189 acres
of land from Benjamin Walker to establish an exclusive club
and racing ground for horse enthusiasts. Shortly after its
founding, the Driving Club entered into an agreement with
the Piedmont Exposition Company (which shared members with
the Driving Club) to hold expositions and fairs on a portion
of the land. The Exposition Company called the fairgrounds
Piedmont Park.
Fair Ground
Many expositions and fairs were held at Piedmont Park during the next
seventeen years, most notably the Piedmont Exposition of 1887 and the Cotton
States and International Exposition of 1895. While the Piedmont Exposition was
regional, the Cotton States and International Exposition was a World’s
Fair. It ran for 100 days, featured 6,000 exhibits and attracted 800,000 visitors.
Several features of the park created during this time remain evident today, including:
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Today’s
ball fields were carved out of the hillside below
the Driving Club to form a horse racetrack. Five
years later, this field hosted the first game in
what has become the oldest intercollegiate football
rivalry in the South, Georgia vs Auburn. From 1902 – 1904,
the Crackers, Atlanta’s original professional
baseball team played ball on the fields of Piedmont
Park before moving to a stadium on Ponce de Leon
Avenue. |
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A small lake was created from
a spring that flowed into the park near today’s
Visitor Center for the exposition in 1887. In 1895,
the lake was enlarged to approximately its current
size of 11.5-acres and named Clara Meer. |
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The stone balustrades scattered
around the park once held steps leading to the major
building built for the 1895 Cotton States and International
Exposition. |
Public Park
In 1887 and again in 1894,
the owners of Piedmont Park considered selling it to the
City of Atlanta. This purchase was a tough sell for a number
of reasons— the
park was considered too far away from the city; although the price for the land
was fair, the City wasn’t in the land business; and Atlanta already owned
Grant Park and didn’t see the need for another park. The third attempt
to sell the park was successful. On June 15, 1904, the City of Atlanta purchased
Piedmont Park and extended its city limits north to encompass the park acreage,
as well as several developing neighborhoods between West Peachtree Street and
North Highland Avenue.
In 1909, the City elected to transform
the decaying fairgrounds into a park and enlisted Olmsted
Brothers, pre-eminent landscape architects of the time, (and
sons of Frederick Law Olmsted), to develop a master plan for the park. Due to
budget limitations, their plan for Piedmont Park was not fully implemented. Nevertheless,
the Olmsted Brothers’ 1912 plan greatly influenced the development of Piedmont
Park. In fact, the current master plan, adopted by the City of Atlanta and Piedmont
Park Conservancy in 1995, honors the brothers’ original vision for the
park.
During its first quarter century as a city park, many features familiar to park
visitors today, were developed.
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In 1910, the first
permanent building in the new park, the rest house
was erected, funded by the sale of the remaining
1895 Exposition buildings. In 1996, Piedmont Park
Conservancy restored this historic building to create
the Visitors’
Center located near the 12th Street gate. |
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During 1913 and 1914, tennis
courts were erected on the site of the old 1895 Manufacturers
Building, the same site as today’s Tennis Center. |
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To support the swimmers, a
wooden bathhouse was built in 1911, eventually replaced
by the current stone bathhouse in 1926. Clara Meer
was host to swimmers, diving platforms, sunning platforms
and a giant, double water slide. |
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The Park Drive Bridge was
built, which provided residents of the developing
neighborhoods east of the park more convenient access.
(1916) |
While the park experienced few physical
changes from the 1930s to 1960s, the next two decades were
a sea of change. In 1976, the high ground of Piedmont Park
was leased by the City of Atlanta to the Atlanta Botanical Garden. In 1979, the
golf course was closed, freeing up 70 acres of green space on what is now Oak
Hill and the Meadow. In 1983, Piedmont Park was closed to through traffic, creating
a more pedestrian-friendly park and opening the pathways to a new mix of wheeled
traffic—skateboarders, bicyclists, and rollerbladers.
During the 1970s and 1980s, the rapid growth of organized events produced a dramatic
increase in park usage. The Dogwood Festival (est. 1936), the Arts Festival of
Atlanta (est.1954) and Gay Pride (est.1972) attracted large, diverse crowds to
the park. In-park musical performances also took center stage, ranging from the
Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and Allman Brothers concerts, to the Montreux Jazz
Festival. Increased park usage compounded by a decreased city budgets led to
a clear deterioration of Piedmont Park. Now also plagued by illegal activities,
it became clear that a long-term solution to fund the care, maintenance and security
of park was critical.
The solution was a public-private partnership.
In 1989, unwilling to accept the decline of their beloved park, a small group
of concerned citizens and civic leaders joined together to form Piedmont Park
Conservancy, a private, nonprofit organization dedicated to the restoration and
preservation of Piedmont Park. In 1992, The Conservancy established a Memorandum
of Understanding with the City of Atlanta, making official the public–private
partnership and mutual goals to rehabilitate and maintain Piedmont Park.
Through the generosity of corporate, foundation and individual contributions,
Piedmont Park Conservancy has raised more than $23 million in private funds to
complete the first half of the Master Plan restoration, including the renovation
of Oak Hill, Lake Clara Meer and the Meadowlands. Through its member support,
Piedmont Park Conservancy funds landscaping maintenance workers and off-duty
police officers to keep Piedmont Park safe, clean and beautiful, and offers a
variety of educational programming through its new Community Center.
Through the work of Piedmont Park Conservancy and its members and supporters,
century-old Piedmont Park is once again the premier green space and central gathering
place of Atlanta.
To learn how you can help improve Piedmont Park, click Support
the Park. To learn about educational and recreational programs offered by
Piedmont Park Conservancy, click Discover
Our Programs.
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As the old adage says, “we have all
been warmed by fires we did not build and shaded
by trees we did not plant... ” Perhaps the ultimate question
for a responsible citizenry is not how will we live, but how will
the coming generation live?
Donald Keough
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