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The Agriculture and Consumer Affairs Committee of the Georgia House of Representatives voted 6-5 Wednesday morning to pass House Bill 302 prohibiting local governments from regulating building design of one or two-family dwellings.
The Georgia Conservancy notes that HB 302 "has the potential to hinder, if not completely remove, innovation at the local level to address needs or leverage assets related to natural resources, housing, revitalization, or other land use conditions." Read more about this bill and how it might affect local governments' abilities to regulate new construction in Flagpole and Oconee County Observations. You can also find the full text of the bill online. Folks from ACC, Koons Design, and the BNA met at Boulevard Park recently to do the penultimate inspection prior to the park being open again to the public. Only major item is to put in two benches (in progress), clean out some dead tree limbs, and a few minor fixes to playground and paths. No firm dates, but in general things should be wrapping up within about a month.  Other good news from Alex Bond at Athens-Clarke County is that there is now a mechanism in place for private contributions to fund water fountains in the county. Phase II will have a water connection for landscaping, which can be used to supply a water fountain in the future. Perhaps a water fountain (human + dog) could be part of the park's future, via private funds, once the dust settles on Phase II.
According to the ACCPD the following crimes were reported in January 2019:
Athens-Clarke County police encourage all residents to say something if they see something suspicious in the neighborhood. You don’t need to wait for a crime to happen before you call the police. The number to call is 706-613-3345. The police will respond and check things out. Residents can also call 911, explain that it's not an emergency, and the police will respond.
The BNA Steering Committee will meet at 7 p.m. Monday, Feb. 18, at Lotta Mae's meeting space on Barber Street. You can view the meeting agenda online; if you have an item you would like to propose for discussion, please email John Devine for consideration.
Voting on the agenda for the Chase Street reconfiguration by the Mayor and Commission has been postponed until September 4, 2018.
The Chase Street corridor study includes the following elements.
Read more on the Athens-Clarke County website. Local businesses Jittery Joe's, the Grit, Ike & Jane, Old Pal, Pulaski Heights BBQ, Heirloom Cafe, White Tiger and Seabear Oyster Bar were all included in a write-up in the April issue of Atlanta Magazine.
Read the full story online. Hundreds of dogs dressed up in outfits and strutted their stuff through the Historic Boulevard Neighborhood on Oct. 15. A charitable event, the Boo-le-bark parade donates all profits to Athenspets, a local volunteer organization that helps the Athens-Clarke County Animal Control.
The event took place for a second-year in a row and featured dogs sporting football jerseys, dressed up as scarecrows or just plain red bows. Check out the video featuring 100 dressed-up pups. By Marci White - July 2011 When Bradford Allgood was a boy growing up in the Boulevard neighborhood, he rode downtown with his father in a horse and buggy to the barn where his dad owned a livery business on Clayton Street. Few people had cars. His parents kept a full menagerie of farm animals in their backyard along with a large garden. On Sundays, he and his friends would ride their horses all afternoon on paths in the woods, and then stop by a natural spring off Barber Street, where they could picnic and get fresh water. Mr. Allgood was born in July of 1921, in the big white house at 225 Beulah Avenue. He was the youngest of six siblings and a third-generation Athenian. His mother, Neva Allgood, was a housewife and his dad, Alvin, ran his livery business — first downtown and then behind their house. He sold mules and horses and also leased out teams of work horses and wagons. Bradford lived on Beulah Avenue for his entire 89 years, with the exception of four years in the military during World War II, which he spent mainly in Africa. Mr. Allgood died on January 23, 2011. His wife Polly still lives in the stone house on Beulah, where they lived together for the last 59 years. They have one son, Carlas. Bradford and Polly’s grandchildren, Matthew and Christy, now live in the white house that their great-grandfather bought in 1917. Bradford’s brother Carl also lived on Beulah Avenue for most of his life, until he passed away in 2001. Mr. Allgood worked for 45 years as a machinist at Keller Machine Company. His wife Polly worked at Athens Housing Authority for 21 years. They were both active in their church, The First Christian Church of Athens. In 2008 I was fortunate to get to talk to Mr. Allgood, who was my neighbor, about his life and some of the changes he witnessed in our neighborhood over a span of nearly 90 years. Marci White: Did you raise a lot of your own food back then, or buy it? Bradford Allgood: My mother bought a lot of it. But we had a barn. We had horses, chickens, a pig pen; we had cows — not just one; we had five or six cows all the time. We raised chickens to gather the eggs. Had everything you’d have in the country. We always had a big garden. She spent a lot of time cooking – she had to, with so many of us. Mr. Daily owned that store that’s on the east side of Beulah. He ran a store out of his front porch. It was just a little old store, a general store. People used to walk there to get their groceries — they didn’t have to go to town.  Bradford Allgood’s father Alvin stands with a horse and buggy in front of the stone house on Beulah Avenue. MW: Did a lot of people in the neighborhood have livestock like your family did? BA: Those who had the space did. Carolyn Reynolds’ family had a cow. My dad bought the big white house with the land going all the way to the last house on the street, and the land went almost down to the creek. Our family built the three smaller houses. ... My brother Carl is the one who built the stone house. He hauled the granite from Elberton. Polly Allgood: Their family had the most animals of anyone because they had a lot of space. His dad also had a barn downtown for the livery business (it was located where Chick Piano is now), and the farm in Jackson County. It was 80 acres and he had some people who lived there ... It was 7 miles from here. BA: Yeah, we used to visit them on the farm in a horse and buggy. We’d sit on the back side of the buggy. MW: Do you remember when they outlawed farm animals in town? BA: I think it was after the war. It had to be after the war, because we kept horses for people after the war. Of course we had a pony then. PA: Nobody ever complained about us having a pony. BA: Well, it was grandfathered in. There was nothing they could do about it. I didn’t want any more after he died; that was enough. MW: Did you have hired help at your house? BA: Yes, we always had someone. There was one old black man who was with us. His name was Frank Cooley and he stayed here at the house with Mama. He worked for her; he washed dishes and everything else. He lived in a room in our basement for a long time. Then he lived over on Lyndon Avenue. He was bad about drinking and that was the reason we finally had to let him go. My dad talked about taking him downtown to work at the barn, but he said, “Uh-unh, I’m staying here with Miss Neva.” He felt like one of the family. There was Aunt Beely…when my mom needed help she’d call her and she would come. And she came to visit my mother when my mom got too old and couldn’t work. She’d come to visit. There was another man who was deaf and dumb. He couldn’t speak or hear but he was a good worker. He worked with my brother a lot and he helped to build the stone house.  Bradford and Polly Allgood. MW: Did your family have a car when you were growing up? BA: We had a car when I was a teenage boy. But there weren’t a lot of them; very few people had them. ... I remember going with my dad in a buggy to feed his livestock in town. My mother used to take me to the doctor in town on the streetcar. That’s the way we went to town, on the streetcar. MW: Did you like riding the streetcar? BA: Oh yeah, I enjoyed it. A lot of people used to ride ‘em on Sunday just to have something to do. When the streetcars weren’t in operation they were kept up where Georgia Power is on Boulevard. The streetcars used to go on Boulevard, then to Barber Street, then Prince and on around downtown. It used to go down the Dougherty Street hill and I remember it felt like I was going to fall over on the hill there, coming down. They went to Milledge Avenue and all the way to Five Points. They did away with the streetcars a long time ago, I don’t know when. During the War they took the streetcar tracks for metal, to use for the military. MW: Did people walk a lot more back then? BA: Yeah, and roller skate. I used to skate to town all the time. I used to go up to the corner of Beulah and Boulevard where Carolyn Reynolds lives, sit on their steps and put on my skates. I’d skate up to Chase Street and all around Chase Street School. I went to kindergarten on the corner of Nantahala and Chase where that plumbing place, Devore and Johnson, is now. There was a big building there that was a community building. Then I went to Chase Street Elementary when it opened; I think it was built in 1920 or 1921. I went to a high school that used to be right where the Captain D’s on Prince Avenue is now. It was the only high school in Athens and was for both boys and girls. The middle school was on Childs Street. MW: Did you used to ride a horse much? BA: Yeah, I had a horse all my life. I had my first pony when I was 7 years old. I would ride all around the neighborhood. I was the only one of my siblings to have a pony — my brother Carl said that was because I was the baby. But he never cared about it like I did. When he got older he got his own horse. MW: What were the roads made out of? BA: Dirt, except the main road out here, Boulevard. It was cement and later asphalt. There weren’t too many cobblestone streets around here, but those old cobblestones were rough. When I came back from the service they had paved some of the streets and when the bus hit it, it was so smooth — I couldn’t believe how smooth it was. A few of us would meet here and go out riding on our horses. We’d probably ride for three hours, mostly on Sunday afternoon in the summertime. We’d go out Newton Bridge and out there on them dirt roads about as far as we wanted to go. I was just telling Polly how we went out there in the woods to rest the horses. One time this boy went to get back on his horse but the horse didn’t want him so he just started bucking. That boy had never ridden before, so I gave him my horse and rode that other horse back home. There used to be a spring called Lyndon Spring. If you go down Barber Street where the chicken place is, it used to be on the left. The spring was about where the by-pass is now. They must have funneled that water into a branch down below it. It was a nice spring. There was a frame building where the spring was, a building for the spring, and there was a picnic ground. They talked at one time about making a park there but it never happened. MW: Would people get their drinking water there? BA: They could. They sold the water here in town for a long time. They’d have these big bottles and put them on wagons and go around selling the bottles to different offices. There weren’t too many cobblestone streets around here, but those old cobblestones were rough. When I came back from the service they had paved some of the streets and when the bus hit it, it was so smooth — I couldn’t believe how smooth it was.  In the late 1920s, Bradford Allgood rode his pony through the Boulevard neighborhood. When he got older, he and his friends would venture out Newton Bridge Road, where they could find dirt roads for riding all day. Above, Allgood as a boy stands at 235 Beulah Avenue, where he was born. Behind him are the railroad tracks and beyond, the old ice and coal factory. MW: Was the train here when you were a boy? BA: Yes, I always remember it being here. I remember that ice plant was there and they used to put ice in the ice cars to ship it. During the summertime, especially. They’d work down there all night, making ice. There was a coal factory there, too. MW: How did your family keep ice? BA: We had a refrigerator with an ice box. There were wagons that would go around and sell you however much ice you wanted. And if we needed ice we could just go around to the factory to get some. We used to watch them make ice a lot. They had these big cans and a roller thing they’d fill with water and then they’d turn them over and let them set there until they froze. Then they’d run water over the can and ice would come out. MW: How did it make the water turn to ice? BA: I have no idea! MW: You didn’t have air conditioning then, did you? BA: No, the first air conditioning we had was at theaters. There were only three theaters in Athens. I went every weekend. The Strand Theater would have a cowboy movie and me and a couple other boys went every chance we got. It cost 10 cents; after the war it was 55 cents, which was still cheap. Polly and I had a window A/C unit at first, and it was so good we got the central put in. MW: Did you have electricity growing up? BA: Yes, we always did. But we cooked on a wood stove. I bought my mother the first electric stove she had and my daddy said things never tasted as good as they did on a wood stove. We heated with coal. We had a big coal heater here in the front room. It was hooked into the fireplace but I don’t remember ever using the fireplace. We heated with coal and cooked with wood. The wood stove also helped to heat the house. To get hot water we had to heat it on the stove and pour it into the bathtub. Finally we got an electric water heater. MW: Was it a lot of work to take a bath? BA: Yes, it was. We didn’t take baths that often but we had one on Saturday whether we needed it or not (laughing)! It wasn’t that big a deal … you could heat enough water. And usually in the summertime we didn’t need to heat water – we’d just fill the big washtub with cool water. MW: How has the social life of the neighborhood changed? BA: Back then it was everybody. People didn’t worry about crime much; you could leave your door open. There was no television to watch. People sat on their front porch. Kids played hide-and-seek and kick-the-can. There was more activity, really. We used to play ball up there where the church is now at the corner of Nantahala and Seminole. It used to be a big vacant field. Of course we had our chores to do. Like at Christmastime we’d bring enough stove wood and coal so when Christmas came, we didn’t have to do it. We piled it on the back porch. For kids today, they wouldn’t make it … you really had to work and they’re not used to it. You didn’t have a car to run around in all the time. The neighborhood, we used to get together and go to my dad’s farm up there to have picnics and fish fries, barbecues. ... Anyone who wanted to go could come along. And we had square dancing. There were two houses at the farm and in one of them we had the dancing. I used to love to dance. It was more easy-going then, I think. Everybody wasn’t in a rush. Like I remember one time my brother Alvin was coming across Nantahala Avenue on his horse. He had eggs in his hand and the horse stumbled out there because there used to be some ruts in the road. He didn’t break an egg… things like that  Neva Allgood, Bradford Allgood’s mother, stands with her horse, Spot, in 1943 on Beulah Avenue.  By Rob Simpson (with Marci White)
When I first moved to Boulevard, in 2005, it was a common sight to see Carolyn Reynolds (“Miss Carolyn”) and her Sheltie dog, Pretty Baby, walking up and down the sidewalk a couple times a day. Smiling, waving and chatting, she was one of the most constant presences on the street then, as she has been for the past three quarters of a century. Born in Columbia, South Carolina, on Jan. 5, 1928, Carolyn Joyce Brandenburg was diagnosed with infantile paralysis (polio) when she was 9 months old. After a miraculous recovery, she moved with her family to Athens in 1935. Her father worked as a car inspector for Southern Railroad on a line that traveled from South Carolina to Athens. As an adult, she worked for years with the phone company, where she met her future husband, Doyle Reynolds. They lived for a couple of years in Atlanta until Carolyn’s parents became ill. The couple then moved into the Boulevardier Apartments (now Calais) to be near and care for her folks. After their passing, the couple moved into their house in Boulevard in the early 1970s. Saddened by the demolition of numerous fine houses in Athens, Reynolds served several terms on the city council in an effort to preserve neighborhoods. The Reynoldses lived together until Doyle died, in the 1980s. Until recently, when she was moved to an assisted-living center, Reynolds has lived alone in her family’s house, waving from her porch at all who pass. Reynolds agreed to speak with Marci White and myself about her life on Boulevard. When White asked her, “What are some of your favorite memories of childhood in this house?” Reynolds responded, “Mother cooking such good food. She learned from her mother and grandparents. And her grandparents were from Germany, and they’re good cooks. She was a good cook. At Christmastime she would make four or five kinds of cakes.” She recalled that her mother made Japanese fruit cake, pound cake, coconut cake and chocolate cake, especially at Christmas. “Whatever we wanted.” Reynolds said her mother also made great rice (steamed, not gummy), greens and cakes, as well as biscuits. The family kept a cow and chickens for milk and eggs and had a vegetable garden. Her father “wasn’t overly fond of vegetables,” but he kept the garden for his wife and family. Reynolds’ mother did not teach her how to cook. She wanted her children to “have a good childhood,” not bogged down with chores. Reynolds did have to rake leaves, however, and deal with the sweet-gum balls. When we talked about accents, Reynolds told a story about someone talking to her mother and asking where she was from. She said, “It was real funny. Mother said, ‘Charleston, South Carolina’ And they said, ‘Oh, I thought you were a Yankee and ashamed of it trying to disguise your voice!’” White asked, “Was your family musical?” Reynolds said, “We sang together. At Christmas, when we were small, the lights would be off. We’d be singing Christmas carols. And then we’d hear, ‘Ho ho ho!’ and the door would open and a bag of candy would fly through the air. It was supposed to be Santa Claus, but it was Mama.” As children, they would play baseball and football with Carl Bradford Allgood in the field on Nantahala at Seminole where the house/church is now. They were not allowed to cross the railroad tracks. Reynolds remembers playing hopscotch in the yard and skating on the street or at the school, as well as playing on the playground at Chase Street School. There was a grocery store on Boulevard owned by the Chance family, who lived across the street from Reynolds’ home, in the brick house. Reynolds said, “We’d get a nickel, and we’d go down there and look at the counter and decide what we wanted. . . . I could take a nickel and get a ‘three-center’ drink, two cookies and a Baby Ruth candy bar.” When White asked if Reynolds worked or went to school and if she went to college, Reynolds said, “No. I should have, but I was so tired of going to school, and our job with the telephone company.” White mentioned that Bradford Allgood’s family used to have big picnics and asked if Reynolds ever went to those. Reynolds said, “No. I was too small. But on Barber Street, I think it’s where the overpass goes over Barber Street, they called it Linten Springs, and people would go there and picnic.” White asked, “Do you remember when the spring was paved over? Was there a fight to keep it?” Reynolds said she didn’t think there was a fight. “The bypass was going to come through anyway. When they decide they’re going to do it, they’re not going to pay any attention to anybody. If more houses were going to be torn down, we’d fight that. . . . The sad thing to me was seeing the old high school torn down. The gym is still there, I think. The school used to be where Barber ran into Prince. There was no cut-through street by the Bottleworks.” She added, “It was really the old courthouse at one time. It was well built and it should not have been torn down.” White asked if there was an effort to keep it from being torn down. Reynolds said, “I think there was. The Mell Aditorium was torn down there. . . . It was one of the best buildings, and that’s where the graduation services were.” Reynolds’ priority on the city council, on which she served several terms, was to protect old homes and the neighborhood. She said, “We were upset about houses being torn down and apartments being put up.” She doesn’t recall how she was selected to run for election but mentioned that there was a neighborhood meeting about it. When asked what she wants her legacy to be in Boulevard and how she wants to be remembered, Reynolds said only, “That I was friendly.” As of September 2012, the Historic Preservation Commission has reviewed the designation report and has recommend it move on to the mayor and commission. View the final version of the report.
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