Atlanta and Savannah Georgia USA scenes. (Windows theme)

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George Hazelton

Active Member
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High Museum of Art, Atlanta, GA USA.
This is a skylight in an atrium in the Renzo Piano designed building. Pentax K10d.
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A store window in Cabbage Town, an old mill town in Atlanta. This is a pleasantly bohemian area with some good cafes. I have no idea what a Retina Scope is. I'm not sure I want to know! Taken with Pentax K10d
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Savannah, on the Atlantic Ocean, was declared an open city in the Civil War (1861-1865) and thus wasn't destroyed. In more modern times it often lacked the funds for "urban renewal," that US program of razing old buildings to be replaced with generally second rate architecture. As a result the city, laid out in a grid with many parks, has character and charm sadly uncommon in many of our cities. Little gems like this abound. Pentax K10d.
 
Ah the retina scope ... A very clever device! Primary function - boarding up a broken window(?) :)

I find it difficult to get my head around what it must be like living in a country with such a relatively short architectural history...
Where I live in Worcester we have a lot of Tudor buildings and a cathederal that has been there in one form or another for well over a thousand years ... Although it has changed somewhat in the period
I just take these things for granted really, mostly because they are not uncommon!
 
Some nice shots there. Looking forward to seeing more. I go to Charleston, South Carolina for work a lot and it's very similar.

Not sure what you mean by Savannah being declared an "Open City" during the Civil War. It was the largest city in Georgia at the time and one of its largest ports. It was firmly in Confederate hands throughout the war, and capturing Savannah was Sherman's objective in his famous "March to the Sea". Sherman threatened to destroy the city and it was under siege for several weeks in December of 1964, but the Confederate General defending the city chose to evacuate his army to South Carolina and so the city fell to the North at the end of that month.
 
I think Brother Darren made a typo! The Southerners tend to hold grudges. The "Lost Cause" is a virtual industry in much of the former Confederacy.

I guess he and I differ in our use of the term open city. The residents could have chosen to resist Sherman; Sherman certainly could have burned the city. Here's a citation describing the surrender of the city by Savannah Mayor R. D. Arnold to Union General Geary, regimental commander in Sherman's army: http://georgiainfo.galileo.usg.edu/tdgh-dec/dec21.htm

Charleston SC is also a most charming city. We in the US can find only a few areas with surviving structures much older than 600 years, whether of European origin or Native American. I hope we can stop tearing down what might be viewed as treasures by future generations.
 
Yes, 1864, of course! That's a big typo! Yikes.

As far as the Civil War (or the War of Northern Aggression, as the Southerners sometimes call it :-) is concerned, I agree with George that there are definitely those in that part of the country who still have strong feelings about it. I remember once touring a historic plantation outside of Charleston, where the docent spoke in an elegiac tone about the glorious utopia that was South Carolina before those nasty Yankee savages came down and burned, raped, and pillaged everything. Even the slaves at this plantation were reported to have been devoted to their masters and been quite content with their situation *cough* *cough*.

In any case, there's no question that the mission of Sherman's Army at the time was more to terrorize and demoralize the South than anything of military strategic importance, and his troops did an awful lot of what would likely be considered war crimes today.

Hardee was initially determined to defend Savannah, and his army withstood a siege for several weeks. But once the Southern river fortifications fell and Sherman's army could get reinforced from the sea, he realized it made more tactical sense to leave the city and retreat across the river to South Carolina, rather than getting caught in a trap and seeing Savannah suffer the same fate as Atlanta had just six months prior, while losing his army, too.

OK, sorry about the dirt road. I'm a history buff and tend to get carried away. Now, back to photography!
 
Oh, as far as architectural heritage is concerned, that's definitely true that Europe has it much better than we do here in the New World. It was sometimes hard for me to get my head around the idea that the apartment building where I lived in Paris was older than the American Revolution by about a hundred years! But the historic downtown areas and older residential neighborhoods of Savannah and Charleston I think have a lot more in common with England than the US, to me, anyway.

Have you ever seen the film "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?" Most people in Savannah will probably say it's nothing like their city, but it did provide a fascinating glimpse at that beautiful city and the eccentricities of its residents.
 
"Have you ever seen the film "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil?" Most people in Savannah will probably say it's nothing like their city, but it did provide a fascinating glimpse at that beautiful city and the eccentricities of its residents." to quote Darren.


While the film is okay, the book is better, as is so often the case. An aside to those who have seen the film or read the book, the Lady Chablis performs regularily in Savannah.
 
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