Published: July 27, 2007 04:55 pm      

Modern Atlanta is a hectic mixture of cola, controversy and classic style

Frankly speaking, I agree with my uncle — Atlanta’s status as a Southern city is becoming increasingly less by design and more by simple geography.

The constant rumble of Interstate 85, Interstate 75, and Interstate 20 is overlaid with a topping of jets from Hartsfield International Airport, and ringed with the old faithful hum of diesels faithfully pulling freight along the Norfolk-Southern line.

Unless one happens to walk along in the shade of the magnolias or takes a side trip to the “Jonquil City” of nearby Smyrna, it may appear that the Home of the Braves is somewhere far north of the Mason-Dixon line. This Georgia metro area of more than 4 million residents is absolutely alive with the sound of industrial music.

Giant cranes piling girders toward a light blue sky stand in the shadow of the Georgia Dome, that architectural wonder where Michael Vick may or may not be employed in the upcoming National Football League season. No sleepy city in the piney woods, this place is buzzing over the controversy surrounding player No. 7, hailed as the most exciting player in the NFL and predicted to be the man most likely to lead the (so far) champion-less Falcons to the promised land of the Super Bowl. Only a long forward pass away, it would seem, from the amazing stadium sits the charming turn-of-the-century red brick home where a true icon created a classic that did reach the pinnacle of the profession.

It is “the dump” as Margaret Mitchell labeled the residence on the corner of 10th and Peachtree where “Gone With the Wind” was completed after a 10-year effort. Mitchell had filled some 63 folders with typed copy by the time a publisher finally laid eyes on the massive manuscript penned by a former energetic Atlanta Journal-Constitution reporter who filed her feature pieces under the byline “Peggy.”

By the time the story was ready to be told by Hollywood, the city was bursting to celebrate the event with a series of public spectaculars. One would include a native Atlantan who, like Mitchell, would achieve world-wide fame. His name was Martin King. His father, Rev. Martin Luther King Sr., decided to have the Ebenezer Church choir perform as part of a 1939 celebration by the Junior Classical League. Although the elder King was criticized by some as supporting a story which was accused of perpetuating African-American stereotypes, he defended his position by saying that the novel “put Atlanta on the map” and he was supporting that.

That courage was not lost on his 10-year-old son, who won the Nobel Peace Prize and became the greatest civil rights leader in a century before finally giving his life to the cause of equality and non-violence. He sleeps in his final resting place in this city, where tourists, pilgrims, and historians come from all over the United States and the world to pay their respects.

Few would argue with Gone With the Wind’s rock-solid reputation as one of the premier novels of all time, and arguably the greatest written by any American woman.

It is a rock like perhaps no other that provides foundation for the entire area. Stone Mountain, the largest granite monolith on earth, stands sentinel just outside the city. Rising nearly 1,400 feet above sea level, the great rock is at once as forbidding as the surface of the moon and as impressive as Mount Rushmore. Surrounded by a splendid state park, it is the state’s best-known attraction.

No doubt the most recognized corporate name in Georgia (or anywhere else) is Coca-Cola. John Pemberton put the formula together here in 1886 and on any given day enough “Coke” is consumed to put together a line of bottles which might stretch around the world a time or two.

Here, too, Ted Turner’s mega-media empire including CNN, Headline News and Turner Broadcasting beams into more than 100 million homes worldwide around the clock. It has changed the way we view the news. Turner’s gamble on a fledgling industry has paid off with the biggest winner’s share in the history of broadcasting.

As my wife and I head home jostling with strings of cars, trucks, and tractor-trailors stretching as far in 10 lanes as the eye can see, one thing is apparent.

The corporate South is not going to rise again in Atlanta — it already has.

Larry Hypes is a columnist for the Daily Telegraph and teacher at Tazewell High School.