Ghostlanta :: Haint Blue

Every old house in the South has a blue porch ceiling because the Lowcountry Geechee believed spirits can't cross water. The color is called Haint Blue and the only store that mixes it by that name is a Sherwin Williams in Beaufort, SC.

Sometimes whole houses and blocks are Haint Blue because no one is shy to talk about spirits in the Coastal Empire. Atlanta may be haunted but we just ignore them.

Ghostlanta :: Rich's Great Tree

RIP a long time ago to the Rich's Great Trees in downtown and Underground. This year it's the Macy's Artificial Tree in the Lenox Parking Lot.

1949

1960s

2012

Macy's is playing if they can parade giant balloons around NYC on Thanksgiving morning but can't put up a real pine tree in ATL Thanksgiving night without dropping it thru the roof of Lenox onto the tuxedos.

Crystal Bridge 2013

Images Atlanta Time Machine and Atlanta History Center

Ghostlanta :: Peachtree Plaza Lagoon

In 1977, Atlanta didn't have a real aquarium yet but we temporarily had the tallest high rise hotel in the world. With a lagoon in the atrium.

But it makes sense for a city that keeps burning down to have a water fetish.


1977 images Atlanta Time Machine.

Ghostlanta :: Sawed-Off Skyscraper

Savannah banks off its historic buildings, but Atlanta builds and destroys them like Legos. Even buildings like the Dome become history if we can afford a better one, which makes Hillyer Trust Company's history even funnier.

1913

In 1911, The Hillyer Trust Company building was 8 stories high and the tallest, thinnest skyscraper in the US. By 1978, weather damage and underground blasting for MARTA had it swaying in the wind. But instead of burning or imploding like most ATL buildings die, they just razed the top six floors and put a bar in the basement vault.

2008

Photobombed by a bulldozer for the streetcar.

1913 and 2008 images Atlanta Time Machine.

Ghostlanta :: Skeletonz

"Architecture I know to be a Great Spirit ... Any building is a byproduct of eternal living force, a spiritual force taking forms in time and place." -Frank Lloyd Wright

Flatiron Building, 1897


Century Building, 1901


Alexander Coliseum, 1956

Images Atlanta Time Machine and Atlanta History Center.