Atlanta And Its Builders, Vol. 1 - A Comprehensive History Of The Gate City Of The South. Thomas H. Martin
refractory as the impotence of the local authorities was realized. As is frequently the case in small communities, political antipathies and jealousies seem to have divided the population into factions, and the "administration," on the whole, was very unpopular.
In 1845 there was a "new deal" at the town election, but one of the five commissioners, Willis Carlisle, the merchant, being returned to the board. The commissioners elected in March of that year were as follows: Ambrose B. Forsyth, Willis Carlisle, Stephen Terry, James Loyd, sr., and James A. Collins. Among the above names will be recognized some that were later prominent in the public spirit and enterprise of the growing town.
The year 1845 was an eventful one in the history of Marthasville. The Georgia Railroad, which for several years had been toilsomely creeping from Augusta up the Piedmont slope, was completed to Marthasville in the latter part of the summer of that year, and on September 15 the first train came through from the seaboard. As may well be believed, this marked a great epoch in the progress of the little city on the hills, and was made the occasion for a jollification that eclipsed the demonstration celebrating the arrival of the Western and Atlantic a little less than three years before. The old State line had not proven of much practical benefit to Marthasville, because, as the natives expressed it, it "didn't go nowhere." At the time of the arrival of the Georgia Railroad the western connecting line was a rickety sort of "jerkwater railroad," operated but a little way the other side of Marietta. The coming of the Georgia was hailed by Marthasville as the real beginning of her career as a railroad center. It was after nightfall when the first train rolled heavily to a stop in the center of the village, having aboard the president of the road. Judge John P. King, his associate officials, and a distinguished party of citizens from Augusta and intermediate points. Bonfires leapt high in air and hoarse cheers from hundreds of throats greeted the pioneer train and its occupants. Arrangements had been made for a grand reception to the lowlanders, and the following day was spent in feasting and drinking by the thousands of people gathered to welcome the Georgia Railroad to Marthasville. As was usual in political campaigns and on gala occasions, the big crowd resorted to Walton Spring, just at the edge of the townsite, where speech-making was indulged in by the railroad visitors and the local orators. In these speeches, which were cheered to the echo, great things were predicted for Marthasville.
An incident which cost one man his life, and another of the same nature, which was narrowly averted by Judge King, were exciting incidents of the day. Near the rude depot was a deep well which had been carelessly left uncovered. Stepping off the train in the darkness, the president of the new railroad, after being taken in charge by a local committee, proceeded a few paces toward the hotel, and as he was responding to the hearty greetings on every hand, he tottered upon the brink of the dangerous hole, the existence of which was evidently forgotten in the excitement. A dozen hands were outstretched to save him, and he was drawn back to safety in the nick of time. The incident shocked Judge King greatly, and he received hundreds of congratulations on his escape. His death at that time would have been nothing short of a public calamity, being, as he was, the railroad genius of Georgia. As if Judge King's close call were not warning enough to cause the town authorities to close the hole forthwith, another man fell into the well a few hours later and was drowned.
With the coming of the second railroad, Marthasville had a newspaper, founded the same summer. The tiny, crudely printed sheet called The Luminary, was owned and edited by Rev. Joseph Baker, a Baptist minister of the old school, and its contents were more religious than secular, though to keep up with the local happenings was not calculated to tax its diminutive space. Editor Baker was a good man and had a wide circle of friends, but his journal eked out a precarious existence of a few months and was forgotten. There existed ample occasion for a moral reform sheet in Marthasville at the time the Luminary entered the journalistic wilderness, and the reverend editor seems to have taken such a policy as a large part of his mission.
By this time, the sore need of a building in which to hold religious services and school had resulted in the erection by the citizens of a non-denominational church and schoolhouse combined. The structure, a small, weather-boarded one-story house with old fashioned chimneys at each end, was built by popular subscription and occupied a little clearing to one side of the Decatur road, upon the present Scofield lot, between Peachtree and Houston streets, diagonally across from the First Methodist church. Preaching even at this date was irregular and there seems to have been no resident pastor. It is said that the first sermon was delivered in the new church by Rev. Dr. J. S. Wilson, who afterwards became the pastor of the First Presbyterian church of Atlanta. The various denominations were all represented in a small way, and when a clergyman of a particular sect came to town, he "held forth" to those of his church in the little schoolhouse. In this manner the different religious organizations "took turns" in using the structure as a place of worship until they were able to build separate houses of worship. During the week, a public school was conducted in the building.
Some men of sterling qualities and strongly imbued with the town-building spirit had cast their lot in Marthasville. Jonathan Norcross, notable among these, began his business career as the owner and operator of what was literally a one-horse sawmill. This rude manufactory was located in the lower end of the town, on the spot occupied by the old Atlanta and West Point depot. The locality was known as Slabtown, in consequence of so many huts in the vicinity being built of the slabs turned out at the mill. The motive power was an old blind horse. About the time of the arrival of the Georgia Railroad, Mr. Norcross opened a general merchandise store. John Thrasher, the pioneer merchant, having heard that Marthasville was forging rapidly to the front, returned from Griffin, and having accumulated a little money invested it in town lots. By this time, a number of business branches were represented. Collins & Loyd and A. B. Forsyth conducted general stores, and a man named Kile a small grocery. There was a bonnet and hat store run by a man by the name of Dunn, and Stephen Terry had a real estate office. In addition there were several "eating houses," one of which affected the dignity of a hotel. Dr. George G. Smith was a physician. Hardy Ivy still resided in the neighborhood, and a son, Socrates Ivy, born to him on November 2, 1844, was the first male child born on the townsite. T. G. Crusselle was a prominent and active citizen, having come with the entry of the State road as a contractor. He built a log shanty for the accommodation of railroad hands on the site of the Kimball block, the only building at Terminus at the time, excepting Thrasher's store and another hut. The next year after the State road reached Terminus, Mr. Crusselle superintended the moving of a story-and-a-half house by rail from Bolton. The structure was supported in an upright position upon two freight cars, Crusselle and his men riding upon the roof some twenty feet above the track. The house narrowly missed toppling over into the Chattahoochee as it was being hauled across the bridge. It was this building that boasted of being Marthasville's first hotel. F. C. Orme was the postmaster, with Lewis H. Clarke as his assistant. Among the other well-remembered residents of this period were Painter Smith, Hack & Bryant, Joseph Thompson, William Crawford, and Mrs. Oslin, the inn landlady.
The fall that witnessed the running of trains between Augusta and Marthasville saw the western terminal point a straggling hamlet of a score of houses. With the exception of the residences of James A. Collins and Stephen Terry, which were constructed of lumber, the dwellings were built of logs or slabs from the sawmill. No man of any considerable means lived in the place, and those who had acquired a foothold on the townsite had done so with a trifling cash outlay. Land could be bought not far from the center of the village for from $3 to $4 an acre, and a good business lot was slow sale at $50. The Ivy farm embraced much of what was later the fashionable Peachtree district, and the tract of about one hundred acres was sold by the old pioneer for a few hundred dollars. Had he held it he would have been a millionaire. The Mitchell property constituted the cream of the townsite, and repeated efforts to sell lots from it at auction met with indifferent success. Probably in all there was not over a dozen acres of land cleared, exclusive of five acres donated by Mitchell for a public square and railroad purposes. The hamlet was unsightly, and after a hard rain the muddy crossroads where the four or five stores clustered were well-nigh impassable. The countrymen who came to the place to exchange their products for merchandise were generally a poverty-stricken lot, uncouth in looks and manners, and given to an inordinate consumption of a very crude species of corn whiskey. On Saturday, the chief trading day, it is said the "sagers" were wont to "take the town," and, to carry the colloquialism further, "paint it red." There