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Things to do in Atlanta In 1836 the Georgia General Assembly voted to build a railroad to provide a trade route to the Midwestern United States, and its terminus was chosen in 1837. In 1839 homes and a store were built there and by 1842, the settlement—now named Atlanta—had six buildings and 30 residents. By 1854 rail lines had arrived from four different directions, making the young town the rail hub for the entire Southern United States. During the American Civil War, Atlanta was an important railroad and military supply hub. In 1864, the city became the target of a major Union invasion during the Atlanta campaign. In 1864 Atlanta was under union siege for four months. Union General William Tecumseh Sherman ordered all public buildings and Confederate assets destroyed. On September 2, the city surrendered, and on September 7 Sherman ordered evacuation four days before ordering Atlanta to be burned to the ground. The city recovered quickly from the Civil War and grew quickly into a transportation, trade and industrial powerhouse of the Southeast. Henry W. Grady, the editor of the Atlanta Constitution, promoted the city to investors as a city of the "New South", by which he meant a diversification of the economy away from agriculture, and a shift from the "Old South" attitudes of slavery and rebellion. As part of the effort to modernize the South, Grady and many others also supported the creation of the Georgia School of Technology (now the Georgia Institute of Technology), which was founded on the city's northern outskirts in 1885. The city of Atlanta's new symbol, the Phoenix, symbolized this spirit of rebirth. By 1890, the city had a population over 65,000; by 1910, the city had more than 150,000 residents. Skyscrapers began emerging with the 1892 Equitable Building and the 1897 Flatiron Building. The city of Atlanta quickly became a center of Southern business. By 1906, the 17-story Candler Building housed Asa Candler's Coca-Cola company. Atlanta's growth was almost unimpeded from 1870 to 1930, with a small interruption during WWI. Despite discrimination and segregation during the early 1900s, a prosperous black middle class and upper class emerged in Atlanta. Desegregation came in stages: buses and trolleys in 1959,[19] the first restaurants in 1961,[20] theaters in 1962.[21][22] and public schools from 1961–73.[23] In the 1960s, Atlanta was a major center of the US Civil Rights Movement, with Martin Luther King and students from Atlanta's historically black colleges and universities playing major roles in the movement's leadership. On October 19, 1960, a sit-in at the lunch counters of several Atlanta department stores led to the arrest of Dr. King and several students, drawing attention from the media and presidential candidate John F. Kennedy. The 1970s saw the election of the first black mayor, Maynard Jackson, most of the MARTA system's construction, and major suburban growth. The 80s saw the launch of CNN and Atlanta hosting the 1988 Democratic National Convention. In the 1990s, Atlanta hosted the 1996 Summer Olympics and Hartsfield–Jackson Atlanta International Airport became the busiest in the world. The 21st century saw a tornado hit Downtown in 2008, floods in the region, the adoption of a plan to add 40% more green space, the rise of Delta to the rank of world's largest airline, and rapid gentrification of many central neighborhoods.
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