Summerhill’s Next Act

IN THIRD GRADE, WALTER GRIMES MOVED WITH HIS FAMILY INTO AN APARTMENT COMPLEX IN SUMMERHILL, AN ENCLAVE JUST SOUTH OF DOWNTOWN ATLANTA. It was the 1960s, and like most kids in his primarily African American neighborhood, Grimes would roller skate up and around Georgia Avenue with friends. They’d pick out hot dogs and hamburgers from the glass case at Happy Jack’s grocery store, ice skate at Atlanta Stadium at Christmas and sneak into football games at Cheney Stadium. It was the kind of neighborhood where everyone knew everyone.

The Summerhill Grimes remembers so fondly was like its own little town within a city — self-supported and proud. But as forces changed Atlanta over the decades, the neighborhood grappled with new issues. A number of Georgia Avenue’s once-flourishing businesses closed, and the corridor struggled to attract new attention.

Today, the area is the focus of a massive redevelopment venture that began when Georgia State set out to transform Turner Field into the university’s new football stadium and teamed up with private developers led by Carter USA to breathe new life into the surrounding parking lots and bereft buildings. At the heart of the mixed-use metamorphosis is the Georgia Avenue that anchored Grimes’ childhood. For him and other seasoned Summerhill residents, this main street is memory lane.

Just over two years into the dramatic adaptive-reuse project, the vision for Summerhill’s return to a vibrant, sustainable community is starting to take shape.

A handful of the crumbling early 20th-century low-rises lining the main thoroughfare have been rehabilitated by Carter as retail units. The Little Tart Bakeshop has been pouring lattes and plating pastries since January. Next door, Big Softie is filling waffle cones with soft serve and frozen treats while its neighbor, Halfway Crooks Beer, slings cold suds. Across the street, droves of patrons are piling into Junior’s Pizza for savory pies and Wood’s Chapel BBQ — whose name pays homage to one of the neighborhood’s first churches — for the already-famous smoky brisket and downhome sides.

Nearly a dozen more eateries are on deck to open their doors in the coming months, including Hot Dog Pete’s, Hero Doughnuts, Little Bear (farm-to-table fare), Talat Market (Thai food), Concept (American menu) and D Boca N Boca (Mexican dishes). Joining them soon nearby are Redacted, a cocktail lounge, and a third location of Krystle Rodriguez’s (B.A. ’06) java haunt Hodgepodge Coffeehouse.

Just across from the stadium, Georgia State students have started moving into the apartments at Aspen Heights, whose 220 units opened in time for the start of the fall semester.

Under the Georgia State Stadium spotlight, historic Summerhill is beginning its next evolution.

THE OLD NEIGHBORHOOD
For nearly a century, Summerhill thrived on the entrepreneurial spirit of a faithful immigrant and African American population.

Freedmen and freedwomen planted roots following the Civil War and created one of the city’s first African American communities. Faith and education were neighborhood fixtures. Wood’s Chapel and Clarke’s Chapel opened for worship services, and the Atlanta Board of Education established the sole public school for Atlanta’s black children. The Summerhill School became E.P. Johnson Elementary School in 1923.

Soon, Jewish, Syrian and Greek immigrants discovered the neighborhood’s charm and opportunities.

By the 1920s and 1930s, as mom-and-pop delis, bakeries and grocers from national chains sprouted on Georgia Avenue and adjacent streets, Summerhill was designated a local retail district. With a theater, dry cleaners, barber shop and pharmacy, the neighborhood had nearly everything residents could want or need.

Catherine Robinson (M.Ed. ’97) grew up in a home on the corner of Little and Fraser streets in the 1940s and ’50s. She’s shared her memories with Richard Laupus, a community-photo documentarian and author of “There’s Something About Summerhill.” A longtime resident of neighboring Peoplestown, Laupus has degrees in English and international law and politics and recently returned to school at Georgia State to pursue photography.

Robinson says, “At that time, for my family and most of our neighbors, education was everything, except faith was first.” Her mother and father ran a beauty salon and church, respectively, out of the family home. Robinson attended all-black E.P. Johnson, but she went on to become one of the first educators to integrate Atlanta Public Schools in the ’70s.

Like Robinson, a number of Atlantans who would grow up to be famous entertainers and influential city leaders called Summerhill home. Former heavyweight champion boxer Evander Holyfield, singer Gladys Knight, and business mogul and philanthropist Herman Russell shared the ZIP code. The city’s first Jewish mayor, Sam Massell (B.C.S. ’51), was born at the original Piedmont Hospital, which opened in the neighborhood in 1904.

CHANGE ROLLS IN
Once considered Atlanta’s most successful African American neighborhood, Summerhill wasn’t immune to the stresses communities face — development, suburbanization and economic inequity.

In the late 1950s, the area changed dramatically when the expressways were built. The North-South Expressway (today the Downtown Connector) and the East-West Expressway (Interstate 20) run through Summerhill, and the North-South Expressway crosses over Georgia Avenue.

Residents like Grimes and his family clung to the old neighborhood’s intimate culture. They even created a Summerhill neighborhood association to contend with all of the changes. Though it started to dwindle, commercial retail remained on and around Georgia Avenue, the lifeblood of the community.

But the currents of change were strong. In 1964, the city built Atlanta Stadium (renamed Atlanta–Fulton County Stadium in 1975) in Summerhill, clearing additional land for parking. It became the home of the city’s first Major League Baseball franchise, the Atlanta Braves. And while America’s favorite pastime lured fans on game days, the traffic did little to drive business or encourage new residents to move in.

Between 1960 and 1970, the number of businesses dropped from 58 to 25, says Marni Davis, an associate professor of history at Georgia State. In 1973, the Board of Education closed century-old E.P. Johnson Elementary School, which had once been the pride of the community.

As Summerhill found itself fragmented by expressways and estranged from downtown Atlanta’s opportunities, the population dropped, amenities that once sustained it withered away, and drugs and crime moved in.

Emmanuel Dix, who is also featured in Laupus’ “There’s Something About Summerhill,” moved into low-income housing on South Avenue in 1985. He remembers that time well.

“It was very volatile. You didn’t know if you could get out of your car without being robbed,” he says. Now, he and his wife, Justina, run the Summerhill Community Outreach ministry.

After winning the bid for the 1996 Summer Olympic Games, Atlanta constructed Centennial Olympic Stadium just across the street from Atlanta–Fulton County Stadium. As Summerhill would now be in the national spotlight, preparations brought some bracing prospects. But while some buildings got cosmetic makeovers, promises for more widespread rejuvenation fell to the wayside as soon as the Olympics ended. Centennial was then converted into a new baseball stadium (Turner Field) for the Braves, and Atlanta–Fulton County Stadium was demolished for parking. Any outside interest in Summerhill continued to hinge on home games, and such would be the case until the Braves announced a move to the suburbs in 2013.

For Davis and Laupus, introducing this storied history into the public consciousness is critical to Summerhill’s rebirth. Together, they’ve developed an exhaustive digital history and an upcoming public exhibit that lend a voice to the 150-year-old neighborhood, now knee-deep in its next incarnation.

“We have to understand where we’ve come from to understand where we’re going,” Davis says.

A NEW ERA
In 2013, Summerhill saw the first signs of hope in more than a decade. Living Walls, a local nonprofit public arts organization, created a series of colorful murals to reawaken more than a dozen storefronts along Georgia Avenue. That same year, the Braves announced their move to Cobb County, leaving Turner Field open to new ownership.

Georgia State and developer Carter USA, along with partners Oakwood Development and Healey Weatherholtz Properties, had a plan. They envisioned a rebirth of Summerhill, with the conversion of Turner Field to Georgia State’s new football home as the centerpiece. The university would control the stadium acreage and certain parking lots, while Carter and the partners would take on the surrounding acres. Carter subsequently purchased the retail outlets on Georgia Avenue as an enhancement to the project.

The transformation of Turner Field kicked off in February 2017, and the Panthers played on their new turf that fall. But Georgia State’s docket remains full. The university is in the concept development phase for a new convocation center north of the stadium. According to Ramesh Vakamudi, Georgia State’s vice president for facilities management, the construction schedule will be determined following the next phase, which is schematic design. The university plans to tear up more of the old Braves’ parking lots to build a new baseball park for the Panthers, too.

Expansion of Glenn Street, which will border incoming housing complexes, is in phase one of two. In keeping with a promise Georgia State and Carter made initially, the buildout of Glenn Street will help restore Summerhill’s original street grid, which was fractured by the Downtown Connector in the 1950s and further disrupted by the stadium in 1964.

Georgia State will also create a pedestrian crossing between Georgia Avenue and the stadium to enhance neighborhood safety.

Although the university doesn’t have a direct hand in the development along Georgia Avenue, deputy general counsel Bharath Parthasarathy, who is responsible for many of the day-to-day aspects of Georgia State’s involvement in the project, says its interest isn’t limited.

“We’re invested in a vibrant, inclusive Georgia Avenue for everyone’s benefit, from neighborhood residents to Panther fans ready for gamedays, guests and tourists, and our faculty, staff and students,” says Parthasarathy.

Meanwhile, Carter has made strides along Georgia Avenue in its large-scale plan to create a safe, friendly mixed-use community with retail, office space and housing — a nod to Summerhill in its heyday.