Merritt Park

 

Today Amy and Krista gave us a video tour of the neighborhood of the Merritt Park area.  Merritt Park is at the corner of Wallace and Barnes Mill Road in Marietta.

I lived in the late 50s as a teenager with my family on Richard Street which  runs into Cobb Parkway, North, across the street from White Water Park.  Before White Water it was all woods until there was an abandoned rock quarry.  One time a few of us camped out at the rock quarry and fished.  No luck.  About 500 feet beyond the rock quarry was the lake which became Merritt Park.  A high school class mate of mine, Nancy M. lived there..

Nancy was very good writing notes for us, like:  “Please excuse Eddie from school yesterday because he was sick.”

And

“My son Eddie Hunter has my permission to play pool at Past Time Grill and Billiards.”

Wallace Park separates what used to be a lake an Wallace Road.  In that bordering area is children’s playground.  I think it was Krysta in the video that said something about when they drained the lake no bodies were found.   Well, no, not in the lake, however, I remember the news one morning a body of  man  discovered was hanging from on a rope from a limb high up in the tree.  If I remember correctly  they were undecided if was murder or suicide.  I think the person may have had a Latino name.

A few blocks west of Wallace Park is/was a Potters’ Cemetery of unmarked graves.  A blind old man, Charley, and his sister  I used to visit who lived on Glover Street were  buried there.  But are their bodies and other bodies still there?   The highway builders had to dig up a good portion of Potters’ Cemetery to make way for the new I-75.

This below has nothing to do with the Merritt Park area, but it does for Mr. Mereritt with an additional story:

In their research they found that Mr. Merritt, who owned most the land in that area tried to build a subdivision for blacks only just south of what would be Southern Tech (now, Kennesaw State College, South Campus) and the white public would not allow it

Which brings up something else mean and interesting.  In the 1960s the Smyrna mayor and city council ejected all black neighborhoods in Smyrna.  Black neighborhoods in the middle of the city were not part of the city of Smyrna, any longer,  so got none of its protection, such as police or fire rescue.  Sad and inhumane.