Elizabeth Wilson has lived in Decatur, Georgia, since 1949. The Decatur she remembers sometimes is at odds with the city portrayed in the official historical record: published books and other documents that discount and distort the city’s African American contributions to Decatur’s development. As Decatur’s first African American mayor and a key participant in the city’s civil rights history, she recalls a city torn apart by urban renewal and divided by discrimination.

In Wilson’s Decatur, African Americans lived in wood shotgun shacks, duplexes, apartments, and cottages in a segregated part of the city’s northwest quadrant. City garbage trucks rolled through the neighborhood to the municipal trash incinerator which was sandwiched between the backyards of single-family residences and the “City of Decatur Colored School.” Continue reading →

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Some Oakhurst residents call it the old Big H store. Older residents recall the Colonial Stores grocery store. No matter what folks call the site, most agree that the underused strip mall on East Lake Drive west of Oakview Road needs some attention.

Former Colonial-Big H property. December 2011.

For the past four years, commenters on local blogs have written that they’d like to see a Trader Joe’s or other similar store. The current property owner, meanwhile, has been searching for a stable tenant. Few people, however, know that in 1940 the property was slated to become a new movie theater. This post explores some of the property’s history. Continue reading →

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