On Halloween night in 1963 in downtown Marietta Atherton Drug Store blew up. Six were killed and 25 people were injured.
That moment changed the home towners way of life. Atherton Drugstore soda fountain and grill was the informal social center of Marietta and then suddenly a poof and never more.
I was in the Navy in New Jersey at the time but I heard about it within a day.
After I returned home after the Navy I stopped at a Sinclair Station in Smyrna, just south of Marietta to fill up and the attendant came out to put gas in, he was on crutches. I recognized him as a high school buddy of mine, Smitty, several years my junior. He only had one foot. He told me he lost the other foot in the Atherton exposion.
It wasn't the work of anybody evil or anything like that. A leaky gas pipe was the cause.
If you want to read more about the explosion:
http://www3.gendisasters.com/georgia/1960/marietta,-ga-drug-store-explosion,-oct-1963
Life goes on.
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