Update: Mt. Gilead Camp Ground Is Up For Auction 8-15-15 - Maybe the Last Chance to Save it.

(Thanks to Jamie Cooper there's a panoramic video of Mt. Gilead Camp Ground on 8-13-15.)

From Jeff Harbin:

"Just wanted to let you all know that the Mt. Gilead Camp Ground is up for sale again.

"It looks like they are going to try and auction it off on Saturday:

"I really think this may be the last chance to save it.


Thanks to Jamie Cooper

"The asking price ($247,500) is more reasonable this time. They were asking over a million just a few years ago."

Auction Information: Atlanta, GA Area Sale
Method: H&M Auction 
Auction Date: August 15 at 11:00 AM Eastern Time 
Location: Atlanta Airport Marriott 
                  4711 Best Road
                   Atlanta, Georgia 30337 
                  404-766-7900

FOR SALE | BANK OWNED37.4± Acres Residential Land ATLANTA, GA

I don't know when these pictures were taken, courtesy Jeff Harbin:

Click here to the Property Tax Map, the two adjacent blue parcels "2073" I think.

"Regrets Go Only One Way" - "Creomulsion Building" Demolished

Everything about this irritates me and I want to blame somebody. But though I'm a pretty good whiner - real good some say - I'm an inept blamer.

I wouldn't know who to blame anyway. because I don't think this is anyone's preferred outcome.

And if that's so, we're doing this wrong. Even Drew, the master who operated the excavator, told me he can't believe the buildings "we" tear down.

Here are some one-way regrets, pictures, videos, and a map. Discuss amongst yourselves. 


Kit laid a wreath.


The scene on January 3, 2014. Curbed Atlanta has the details.

The Palmetto Trust for Historic Preservation ran a year-end series that rings true for me:

"9. Regrets go only one way.

 "Over the years, I've heard regrets expressed about tearing a building down. 'We just didn’t know' they claim, that a neighborhood was on the cusp of revival, that an old building might have profitable new uses—or that what resulted turned out to be less valuable than what was lost.

"When looking ...  (at) any other old place that survived a battle to exist, do people ever say, 'Darn, we should have torn that building down when we had the chance?'" 

I always thought it was school. It was a block long, hidden by green vegetation for nine months, made ugly by gnarly branches for 3 months, abandoned but intact. It must have been something in its day.


It was no fun taking these pictures. And it rained.


They started on backside.


Imploded without explosives. On a clear day you can now see the Buckhead skyline from here.


The Glen Iris frontage remained intact while the excavator gnawed at the backside.


This is an engaged, pedimented portico, the Parthenon of the Old Fourth Ward, This is as noble as a factory gets.

"The oldest part of the building was constructed in 1929 and was designed by Hentz, Adler, & Shutze." - Kyle Kesler


They tore off the south wing first.


And I could see into the central "tower." It seemed in good shape.


Still impressive with a missing wing.


Then the north wing.


There must have been offices in the north wing.


I started looking at the details, more schoolhouse than cough-drop factory.


You might see details like this in a Buckhead mansion but you won't see them here anymore. Elegant brickwork in broad pilasters, tall metal windows embraced by sturdy sills kissing  the beefy architrave, the sills align with bands that take the eye around the corners. More like furniture than factory.


Perhaps the office door, smaller double-hung windows, a fan light over paneled door.


The north wing came down.



Spooky. The fanlight un-fanned.


Working  towards the middle.


On Saturday just this: a corner and column and a wall.


The ruin.


The arches lay sleeping after after 80+ years of service.


Go see.

I took 230 or so pictures:
2014-12-30 demolition 345 Glen Iris Creomulsion Building Atlanta GA Old 4th Ward
2015-01-02 demolition 345 Glen Iris Creomulsion Building Atlanta GA Old 4th Ward
2015-01-03 demolition 345 Glen Iris Creomulsion Building Atlanta GA Old 4th Ward 

So far I've put 41 videos of the Creomulsion Building demoliton on YouTube, about 33 minutes total. They are like this:

 

The Year in Demolition - Atlanta 2013

We lost a Neel Reid and an I.M Pei this year.


The McCord Apartments by Hentz, Reid & Adler, job number 491 occupied in 1923.


It was on Seventh Street behind the Starbucks.


The I. M. Pei designed Gulf Oil Building. "The building was architect I. M. Pei's first project, built in 1949 ..."  - Wiki


Buffed and ready for apartments, half built as of this writing.


Loca Luna was on the same block as the McCord.


They are repurposing the Ramada Inn.


But the Ramada's parking lot had to go.


Building 1 at the CDC left the campus.


It got a bit sideways in the process.


103 Fort Street is history.


You had to stand on the porch to appreciate the weirdest brise soleil in Atlanta.


Now it's one more buffed lot on the fringes of the Auburn Avenue Historic District and the Old Fourth Ward.


The old stone sanctuary in Hapeville took all year to tear down.


It was a bear.


Most folks never saw it anyway, an unmanageable landmark lost in a place with few landmarks.


The Crum and Forster is 2/3's gone.


It still classes up the neighborhood.


The Hulse House was the shocker, not even 30 years old.


But there it goes.


Mt. Vernon Baptist is in Falcons stadium territory.


Friendship Baptist too, go look before they are gone.

Demolishing the Hulse, Dancing the Rhodes, Moving the Randolph-Lucas - What a Week

I doubt Atlanta has many weeks like this. I am moved. Were you here too?

These deserve research, deep thought, analysis, and opinion. But I'm not blogger enough right now.

Hulse Residence:

Jim Winner tipped me about the demolition the Hulse House in Ansley Park. Designed by Anthony Ames (1984?).


I told Joe Dreher who'd studied this house while pursuing his architecture degree. We kind-of covered it. Joe has some wrenching but fascinating videos of the demo.

Rhodes Theater:

 

gloATL and Living Walls opened the Rhodes Theater for the weekend. It was "The Traveling Show Town Six." I'm standing where the screen was, looking towards where the the lobby was. Designed by Ivey and Crook (1937).


I dropped in on Thursday night to see a rehearsal (above) with Rhodes Hall glowing from across the street. I caught the wonderful Friday night performance too: music, projections, and dance in this gutted but still impressive space.

Randolph-Lucas House:


 
The Randolph-Lucas house moved this week. On Thursday, they took the second floor off. Designed by P. Thornton Mayre (Completed 1924).


It's journey to Peachtree Circle started with an impromptu street and house party about 1 a.m. Saturday morning.

What a week. Were you there too?

Eleven Months into the Church Demolition - Edging Granite

"With the benefit of hindsight, maybe it wasn't such a hot idea." - H I McDunnough in Raising Arizona.

I've followed the demolition since November 2012. It was all but inevitable but nobody wanted it. In 2013 we lost the J.A. McCord Apartments, most of Crum & Forster, and we're about to lose E. Rivers but this one hurts me more. But as performance art it's unmatched in the city.


Yesterday at the remains of old stone church at Hapeville Baptist. The men are trimming the granite matrix back to the corner.

Recapping:


This is from 1954. The portico was still there and the stained glass. Image purchased from the Atlanta History Center.



Fall 2012, though abandoned it was a stunning sight, weight and presence galore.


The southwest wall. The 1964 building wrapped around the east end of the stone church.


They couldn't go all the way to the edge without damaging the new building. Could they have sawn though the granite?


They had to do the rest by hand.


That's what they were doing yesterday.

Here are 47 seconds of delicate, choreographed jackhammer teamwork.









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I regret that few interior pictures have surfaced.

 
The scar from the old stone church.

De-Marbling the I.M. Pei on Ponce and baring St. Paul's Presbyterian

I hope you'll go see, go see this whole block before it's covered in modern apartments so familiar that we'll pay no attention.

They are buffing the block for apartments / mixed use. This week they started removing the marble panels from Gulf Oil Building, 131 Ponce de Leon, designed by I. M. Pei, built in 1949.

They've exposed the west side of St. Paul's Presbyterian. "Isn't that where The Abby was?"


"The project will incorporate the 'Pei' Building at the corner of Juniper and Ponce as its leasing center, making it 'the most dramatic element of the development' according to Branch." - Hunt Archbold, MidtownPatch, July 11, 2012 


Before

On Facebook T-square Interns: "To us it looks like one of many similar buildings scattered around the country, most of them dilapidated and/or mold-infested-beyond-habitability. These buildings were obviously never designed for the long term. We say: let's take them off their respirators. They've had a good life; now it's time to let them go. They'll be better off in the end."


I don't know why they leave these signs up, guess that's another contractor's job.


These are the last intact panels.


There are coming out in pretty good shape. They'll have plenty left over.


They are using doors to block the 2nd floor holes. I love those practical construction folks.


The doors make an amusing band.


A last look at it's best side.



I don't have a picture of  the building next door to the east. It's gone too. I barely remember it as a deep red brick modern, a glass fronted office furniture store. It's been abandoned, boarded up and camped in nearly forever. I just don't remember much. You can see it in the map below.


Tearing it down exposed the west side of St. Paul's Presbyterian, 1915, one of our great church buildings on Ponce de Leon. It's one of three here that I know of by Charles H. Hopson (1865-1941) with Peachtree Christian Church and Rock Spring Presbyterian.


I'm worried about St. Paul's Presbyterian. It will be 100 in 2015. I hope we'll be celebrating.


It hosted several churches, then the Abbey Restaurant, now St. Paul's.


The roof looks fresh. Maintaining the details looks like a chore.


Did somebody heave a brick? What would this cost to fix this? Start by taking the whole window to the shop.


So many huge stained glass windows.


This is how downtown commuters see it on their way home going north on Piedmont. The brick block building with red-out windows doesn't help.


One of the best things about blogging is that it makes me look.

So go look.


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