Baa

This is our last day in and around Atlanta so we got an early start. Something that we wanted to do while in the south was gain a better knowledge of the Civil War, especially from the southern perspective, for, as it is said, the winners write the history books. We had already gotten a clear understanding that the legacy of the Civil War is still very much present in Georgia. Corny perhaps, but for the last two nights we watched Gone With theWind; it's a long movie. It turns out that it was a decent presentation of the attitudes of the south prior to and after the Civil War and certainly Georgians and the burning of Atlanta.

This morning our first stop was the Atlanta Cyclorama which is located right next to the Atlanta Zoo. The Cyclorama depicts July 22, 1864, one day in the Battle for Atlanta. The painting is 358 feet wide by 42 feet tall and is considered the largest in the world. It is longer than football stadium and taller than a five-story building. The thirty foot distance between the painting and the circulating observation platform is filled with a three-dimensional scene the adds to the realism of the depiction. First we went to an auditorium where a sort film, narrated by James Earl Jones, set the background for the battle for Atlanta. We then moved into the huge room that houses the circular painting. It was quite impressive and reminded me of the cyclorama at Gettysburg.

Also at the museum was the locomotive Texas, one of the two engines that was involved in the Union military raid that attempted to commandeer a train and depicted in the movie The Great Locomotive Chase; the General was commandeered and the Texas gave chase.

The "Texas."

The exterior of the Cyclorama which is right next to the Atlanta Zoo.

We finished in the Cyclorama about 11:30 am, and although it was tempting, we passed up the Zoo and travelled to the Atlanta History Center. John, who gave us the tour of the Plantations at Stone Mountain, had recommended it and I'm glad that he did.  It was a great afternoon.

There are a number of parts to the Center. The Atlanta History Museum, the Swan House and Smith Farm and extensive Gardens. We began in the Museum, and because I'm a big fan of the Olympics, we spent a fair amount of time in the Exhibit Hall - Centennial Olympic Games Museum.  There was a collection of multimedia presentations, artifacts, images and interactive displays that covers not only the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta but the history of the modern Olympic Movement. I thoroughly enjoyed it!

Next we visited the Gallery that houses The Turning Point: The American Civil War. Here is one of the largest Civil War exhibitions in the nation. It tells the story of the Civil War through more than 1,400 original Union and Confederate artifacts, photographs, dioramas, videos, and interactive components. It was the best presentation of the Civil War and Reconstruction I have ever seen. It was presented in a very objective way and it achieved our goal of learning about the war from the view of the south as well as the north. 

We spent almost 2 hours viewing the Turning Point and then we went out of the Museum to see the houses and the gardens. This diversion was needed because the Civil War exhibit was very intense.

The Smith Family Farm is a restored farmhouse and outbuildings including an open-hearth kitchen, blacksmith shop, smokehouse, double corncrib and cabin. There are costumed interpreters in the farmhouse. 

The Smith Family Farm.

These sheep kept up an almost constant baa-ing. I think it was close to suppertime for them.

The cabin.

The Swan House is a classically styled mansion built in 1928 for Edward and Emily Inman. Edward, heir to a large cotton brokerage fortune, died just three years after moving into the house from a heart attack when he was 49. Alone in the large house, Emily Inman asked her oldest son Hugh and his family to live with her. Mrs. Inman lived in Swan House until her passing at age 84 in 1965.  The house, furnishings, and 28-acre estate were purchased by the Atlanta Historical Society in 1966 and opened to the public in 1967. In 2004, the Atlanta History Center completed a four year, $5.4 million restoration of the house and its furnishings. In 2012, Swan House was one of the locations used during the filming of the movie The Hunger Games: Catching Fire.

The Swan House has two entrances - the front garden facade is seen from the street, but the driveway takes the visitor to the rear, where a columned porte-cochere offers a protected and private entrance.

The library.

Dining Room.

The black and white marble floor and curved, free-standing stairway.

Victorian Playhouse on the Swan property.

Stepped-down fountain at the front on the house.

Front of the house as seen from the street.

We then toured four of the six historic gardens.

Rhododendron Garden.

Noisy, croaking frog on a lily pad in the Quarry Garden.

Quarry garden. 

Also in the Quarry Garden that shelters one of the state's most comprehensive collections of plants native to pre-settlement Georgia many of which are rare or endangered.

After visiting the gardens we returned to the Museum and made a quick visit through two more galleries. One on the native peoples of early Georgia and a traveling exhibit, The Kinsey Collection, 

that explores the historic, artistic, and cultural contributions and progress of African Americans through rare and historic artifacts, document, books, letters, manuscripts, photographs and artwork by African American artists. Many original documents and pictures that I have seen in history books were in the collection.

Moving day tomorrow. We are off to Helen, in the northeast mountains of Georgia.