50 Fun Facts About Atlanta

Atlanta is the county seat of which county?

Fulton County was carved from DeKalb's western half in 1853, so Atlanta, born a DeKalb town, became the new county's seat; part of the city still sits in DeKalb.

Atlanta's name is said to come from which railroad?

Western and Atlantic: another line's chief engineer, J. Edgar Thomson, coined 'Atlanta' for his depot in 1845, supposedly as a feminine 'Atlantic', and the town dropped the name Marthasville.

What was the settlement that grew into Atlanta first called?

Terminus simply marked where a new state railroad was to stop; in 1843 the town became Marthasville, for the daughter of ex-governor Wilson Lumpkin, a champion of the line.

The state railroad that gave birth to Atlanta in 1837 was built north to which Tennessee city?

Chattanooga was the goal; in 1862 Union raiders stole the locomotive General on that same line and raced north wrecking track, a failed mission remembered as the Great Locomotive Chase.

Which Union general burned Atlanta before the March to the Sea?

William T. Sherman ordered the remaining residents out, then had rail depots, machine shops and factories demolished so the city could never again supply Confederate armies.

Atlanta's fall helped which president win re-election?

Abraham Lincoln wrote in late August that it was 'exceedingly probable' he would lose; Atlanta's capture days later turned the race, and he beat George McClellan easily.

Which Confederate general ordered the retreat from Atlanta as Union forces closed in?

John Bell Hood, his last rail supply line cut, had his retreating troops blow up their own ammunition train, a blast that levelled the city's big rolling mill.

Georgia's state capital moved to Atlanta in 1868 from which city?

Milledgeville lost out after Atlanta, with better rail links, offered the state free government buildings for ten years and land for a new capitol.

Which newspaper editor promoted Atlanta as the city of the 'New South'?

Henry W. Grady took the pitch north in an 1886 New York speech, declaring slavery and secession dead and inviting Northern money into Southern industry.

Which educator gave his 'Atlanta Compromise' speech at the city's 1895 cotton exposition?

Booker T. Washington told the crowd the races could be 'as separate as the fingers, yet one as the hand'; W. E. B. Du Bois later attacked that stance as adjustment and submission.

Atlanta surpassed which city as Georgia's largest in the 1880 census?

Savannah had a century's head start as Georgia's colonial port, yet the rail town founded in 1837 outgrew it within 43 years, 37,409 residents to 30,709.

Leo Frank was lynched in 1915 in which town near Atlanta?

Marietta was the hometown of Mary Phagan, the girl Frank was convicted of killing; after the governor commuted his sentence, armed men took him from prison and hanged him there.

The Great Atlanta Fire of 1917 began in which neighbourhood?

Old Fourth Ward burned as wind drove the flames north to Ponce de Leon Avenue; more than 10,000 people lost their homes, yet only one person died.

Which 1939 film premiered at Atlanta's Loew's Grand Theatre?

Gone with the Wind arrived after three days of parades and balls, with a holiday declared for the occasion and huge crowds lining the streets to watch the stars drive in.

Which Oscar winner was barred from the 1939 Loew's Grand premiere by segregation laws?

Hattie McDaniel talked co-star Clark Gable out of boycotting the premiere over her exclusion; at the next Oscars she was seated at a small table against the far wall.

Which Atlanta author's house museum marks where she wrote her best-selling novel?

Margaret Mitchell wrote most of the book in a small ground-floor flat she called 'the Dump', typing at an old sewing table while laid up with a broken ankle.

Who was elected Atlanta's first Black mayor in 1973?

Maynard Jackson, just 35, made sure minority-owned firms shared in city contracts, above all on the huge new airport terminal he finished 'ahead of schedule and under budget'.

Who in 2001 became the first woman elected mayor of Atlanta?

Shirley Franklin took office in 2002, and in 2006 brokered a last-minute deal that pulled Martin Luther King Jr.'s papers from auction and kept them in Atlanta, at Morehouse College.

Who became mayor of Atlanta in January 2022?

Andre Dickens edged former mayor Kasim Reed for second place in the first round, then beat council president Felicia Moore, who had led it, by a wide margin in the runoff.

Which mayor promoted Atlanta as 'the city too busy to hate' through the 1950s?

William Hartsfield repeated the line through the civil rights struggles of the 1950s, and in 1957 he won his last term by beating the ardent segregationist Lester Maddox, a future governor.

Which city lost the final vote for the 1996 Olympics to Atlanta?

Athens staged the first modern Games in 1896 and wanted the 100th-anniversary edition back; Atlanta won the 1990 vote instead, and Athens had to wait until 2004.

A pipe bomb exploded at which downtown site during Atlanta's 1996 Olympics?

Guard Richard Jewell spotted the knapsack in Centennial Olympic Park and cleared the crowd, then was wrongly treated as the suspect. Eric Rudolph later pleaded guilty.

Atlanta's airport began on a racetrack owned by the tycoon behind which company?

Coca-Cola magnate Asa Candler owned the abandoned speedway. The city leased its 287 acres in 1925 and named the new airfield Candler Field.

Which airline is headquartered in Atlanta and runs its biggest hub at the city's airport?

Delta began as a crop-dusting outfit in Macon, Georgia, battling the boll weevil, moved to Monroe, Louisiana, in 1925, and brought its headquarters to Atlanta in 1941.

Which media mogul founded CNN, TNT and TBS in Atlanta?

Ted Turner beamed a small Atlanta UHF station nationwide by satellite in 1976 as the Superstation, then launched CNN as a 24-hour news channel in 1980.

Which Silicon Valley-style nickname has been given to Atlanta's tech scene?

Silicon Peach grafts Silicon Valley onto Georgia's Peach State nickname, which the state earned as its orchards boomed in the decades after the Civil War.

Which film studio occupies Atlanta's former Fort McPherson army base?

Tyler Perry bought 330 acres of the closed fort in 2015, and his Tyler Perry Studios now keeps a replica White House among its standing sets.

Atlanta has the highest elevation of any major city east of which river?

At about 1,050 feet in the Appalachian foothills, Atlanta sits higher than any other big city east of the Mississippi, which takes some of the edge off its summers.

Atlanta straddles which watershed boundary?

The Eastern Continental Divide runs through downtown, and the early railroads were laid along its ridge. Rain on one side drains to the Atlantic, on the other to the Gulf of Mexico.

Which river forms part of Atlanta's northwestern city limit?

The Chattahoochee is metro Atlanta's main drinking-water supply, which is why Georgia, Alabama and Florida have spent decades in court over its flow.

Which nickname reflects Atlanta's unusually dense tree canopy?

City in a Forest owes more to backyards than to parks: a Georgia Tech survey found most of Atlanta's tree canopy standing on single-family home lots.

Which gold-topped skyscraper became Atlanta's tallest building when it rose in the early 1990s?

Bank of America Plaza was planned as the headquarters of Atlanta bank C&S, but a 1991 merger swallowed the bank before the tower opened, so it debuted as NationsBank Plaza.

Which architect designed Atlanta's Westin Peachtree Plaza and Marriott Marquis hotels?

John Portman often acted as his own developer, and his 1967 Hyatt Regency Atlanta, built around a 22-story lobby, became the prototype for countless atrium hotels.

Which Atlanta movie palace was saved from demolition by a grassroots campaign in the 1970s?

The Fox was designed as a Shriners' temple and opened as a cinema on Christmas Day 1929. Southern Bell wanted the site for its headquarters until the Save the Fox campaign bought the theatre.

Which architect of New York's Madison Avenue Whitney Museum designed Atlanta's brutalist Central Library, his last completed work?

Marcel Breuer's concrete library opened in 1980, a year before his death. Officials weighed replacing it in 2016, but it was spared and renovated instead.

Which uptown Atlanta district is home to the Lenox Square and Phipps Plaza malls?

Buckhead is said to be named for a buck's head that tavern keeper Henry Irby hung on a post in the 1830s. The settlement had been called Irbyville, and Atlanta annexed it only in 1952.

Home Depot co-founder Bernie Marcus gave $250 million to build which Atlanta attraction?

Georgia Aquarium opened in 2005 around a vast tank built for whale sharks. Marcus called the gift his thank-you to the state where he had made his fortune.

Zoo Atlanta's 2013 newborns were the first twins of which animal born in the US since 1987?

Giant pandas Lun Lun and Yang Yang arrived on loan from China in 1999 and raised seven cubs in Atlanta. The last of the family flew back to Chengdu in October 2024.

Which Atlanta fast-food landmark has long billed itself as the world's largest drive-in restaurant?

The Varsity opened in 1928 near Georgia Tech as the Yellow Jacket. Its counter staff became famous for greeting every customer with the shout "What'll ya have?"

Which road is Atlanta's international dining corridor?

Buford Highway's strip malls filled with Korean, Mexican, Chinese and Vietnamese restaurants because newcomers to Atlanta skipped the inner city and settled straight into the affordable suburbs.

Which British punk band played its first American show in Atlanta in January 1978?

The Sex Pistols opened their first US tour at the Great Southeast Music Hall, a club in a shopping center, and dozens of out-of-town reporters squeezed into the sold-out room.

The 1969 Atlanta International Pop Festival took place about six weeks before which far bigger festival?

Woodstock followed with Janis Joplin and Creedence Clearwater Revival, who had both played the Georgia festival. Unlike Woodstock, which left its backers deep in debt, the Georgia show made money.

Which Southern rock band recorded its 1976 live album in Atlanta?

Lynyrd Skynyrd taped the live album One More from the Road over three nights in July 1976, and the run helped raise money to rescue the historic Atlanta theatre that hosted it.

Which Atlanta act won the Album of the Year Grammy in 2004?

Outkast's first single, Player's Ball, first appeared on their label's Christmas compilation, and it still went to number one on the rap chart.

The Braves moved to Atlanta in 1966 from which city?

Milwaukee had hosted the Braves only since 1953, when they left Boston. Hank Aaron made the move south with them and, in Atlanta in 1974, hit his 715th home run to pass Babe Ruth.

The Falcons led 28-3 in Super Bowl LI before losing in overtime to which team?

The New England Patriots scored 25 unanswered points to force the first overtime in Super Bowl history, then won 34-28. No team had ever given up so large a Super Bowl lead.

Atlanta United won MLS Cup 2018 by beating which Pacific Northwest club?

Atlanta United beat the Portland Timbers 2-0 before 73,019 home fans in only the club's second season. It ended the city's wait for a major title that had run since the Braves won the 1995 World Series.

The Atlanta Thrashers relocated in 2011 to become which NHL team?

The Winnipeg Jets name came back when True North bought the money-losing Thrashers in 2011. Atlanta had now lost two NHL teams to Canada, after the Flames left for Calgary in 1980.

Which Atlanta event, held every Fourth of July, bills itself as the world's largest 10K?

The Peachtree Road Race began on July 4, 1970, when just 110 runners finished a course from a Sears parking lot to downtown. Today so many people want in that places are handed out by lottery.

What is the local nickname for the Interstate 285 beltway?

The Perimeter sorts Atlantans into ITP and OTP, inside or outside it. In 1982 Braves pitcher Pascual Perez missed his start after circling it for hours, and fans dubbed him Perimeter Pascual.