Faith in Sweet Auburn: Revival?.....A Seeing Project
Vanessa, my wife, and I moved to Atlanta three years
ago. When we moved to Atlanta we made it
our goal to fall in love with our city. We combed the city that first summer like scavenger hunters. We went everywhere and read all we could
about the history of Atlanta. One book that I couldn’t let go of and read
several times was Gary M. Pomerantz book, Where Peachtree Meets Sweet
Auburn: A Saga of Race and Family. In this book Pomerantz tells the story of
Atlanta through the lens of two families. The Allen family and the Dobbs family
are the centers to Pomerantz’s book.
Both of these families produced mayors of our city.
Ivan Allen Jr. was
the 52nd mayor of Atlanta and he served from 1962 to 1970. Maynard Jackson, the grandson of John Wesley
Dobbs was our 54th and 56th mayor serving terms from 1974
to 1982 and then from 1990 to 1994.
Pomerantz connects these two families in terms of their leadership and
shaping of Atlanta and the two streets that are synonymous with their stories,
those streets being Auburn Avenue and Peachtree. It was in reading this book that I was drawn
into the history of Auburn Avenue to later be called Sweet Auburn.
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| Mayors Ivan Allen Jr. and Maynard Jackson |
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| John Wesley Dobbs |
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| @Ralph Basui Watkins John Wesley Dobbs Monument on Sweet Auburn 2014 |
Legend has it that Maynard Jackson’s grandfather, John Wesley
Dobbs, coined the name Sweet Auburn.John
Wesley Dobbs named the street Sweet Auburn because it was the richest place in
the country in terms of African American wealth. It was the cultural and business center of
the African American community in Atlanta.
In 1956, Fortune magazine
called Sweet Auburn the richest Negro street in the world. The Georgia Trust for Historic Preservation
designated this street, which was once rich, in 2006 as a “Place in Peril.” In
an attempt to revive this historic district one move has been the city of
Atlanta’s streetcar project.
The streetcar project is a 2.7 mile loop that connects the
historic district of Sweet Auburn, to include the Rev. Dr. Martin L. King Jr.
National Historic Site, to downtown. The
hope is to revive this community by providing a new transit route that will
bring both tourist and residents to this area.
The residents will not look like those who were there during the time of John Wesley Dobbs. The new housing in this area is geared to a downtown / mid-town resident
who will be middle to upper middle class. What will Sweet Auburn look like in
the future? Who will walk this
street? Will its history be maintained,
remembered or celebrated? Will the Black
pass of Sweet Auburn be covered over in the green of new dollars, new people,
new tourist traffic and new ways of living?
Should we care? Will we see what
is happening? Will we remember to remember? Does it matter?
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| The Atlanta Streetcar Map http://streetcar.atlantaga.gov |
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| @Ralph Basui Watkins |
I am watching. The
project that I have committed myself to over the next few years is to see what
is happening? Where is urban renewal
taking us? I have begun a writing, photo
and documentary project to tell the story of the transformation of Sweet
Auburn. Is this a revival,
gentrification, urban renewal or simply the next chapter of Sweet Auburn’s
history? I don’t know what this is but
what I ask is that you walk with me as I walk this street, take pictures, do
interviews, shoot video and write about the experience. What will see and what will we do about what
see?
Great post. I will buy this book today and start reading it. I am very interested in watching the efforts at Sweet Auburn and the Beltway. I hope that Atlanta can get it right with both of these efforts.
ReplyDelete@JV thanks Jeff for caring...I appreciate you and your brilliance....
ReplyDeleteGreat Post Dr. I think that your project will enhance the views of others with respect to what it means to be a part of a historic city such as Atlanta. Thanks for posting!
ReplyDeleteReally looking forward to seeing the end results of the project.
ReplyDeleteLiving in the Edgewood area, I am learning more and more about this rich history through your posts. (Thank you!) I believe the history of this area will be celebrated once the streetcar is completed. It will definitely be an interesting what happens over time. Looking forward to your images!
ReplyDeleteIt's clear that your not only passionate about this project but the people and the history that are being effected on Sweet Auburn. The questions that your project poses are questions that need to be answered. I can't wait to see where this photographic journey leads!
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