George Washington Adair (March 1, 1823 – September 29, 1899) was a real-estate developer in post

Civil War A civil war or intrastate war is a war between organized groups within the same state (or country). The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies ...

Atlanta Atlanta ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Georgia. It is the seat of Fulton County, the most populous county in Georgia, but its territory falls in both Fulton and DeKalb counties. With a population of 498,715 ...

Early life

Col George Washington Adair was born 1 Mar 1823, of Scots-Irish parentage in rural

Morgan County, Georgia Morgan County is a county located in the north central Piedmont region of the U.S. state of Georgia. As of the 2020 census, the population was 20,097. The county seat is Madison. Since the early 21st century, the county has had a housing boom ...

. His parents were John Fisher Adair (1785–1856) and Mary Radcliff "Polly" Slaven (1790–1835). His mother died in 1835; his father sent him to Decatur to enter the employ of Green B. Butler as a store clerk. He married Mary Jane Perry (1832–1910) on 7 Jun 1854, in Newton County, Georgia. Col George Washington Adair passed away 29 Sep 1899, in Atlanta, Fulton County, Georgia, aged 76, and is buried in the Westview Cemetery there. There he met James Calhoun, William H. Dabney, Charles Murphy and Ephraim M. Poole, who supported him with the means to study at the Decatur Academy. After two years, he took up the study of law in

Covington, Georgia Covington is a city in the U.S. state of Georgia and the seat of Newton County, and is part of the Atlanta metropolitan area. As of the 2010 Census, its population 14,113. History Covington was founded by European immigrants to the United Stat ...

, and two years later he was admitted to the bar. To satisfy his debts, Adair took a position as a conductor on the

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, a job he held for four years. After leaving the railroad, he spent some time at Covington, and

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. Adair moved to Atlanta in 1854 at the age of 31 and there established what would be his permanent home.

Career

Atlanta

Under the firm name of Adair and Ezzard, Adair embarked in the mercantile business, but after not entirely successful two years, he launched into the general trading, auctioning and real estate business, which would engage him throughout the remainder of his career. During the

, Adair was a newspaperman and a cotton speculator. He already owned the ''Gate City Guardian'' newspaper when in 1861 he bought the ''

Atlanta Southern Confederacy The ''Atlanta Southern Confederacy'' was a strongly Democratic Southern newspaper during the American Civil War. The first issue was February 15, 1859, by Dr. James P. Hambleton. Historian Franklin Garrett explains its quick impact in that Hambl ...

'' and merged the two keeping the name of the latter, assisted by J. Henly Smith. After the paper went under. Adair became an aide on the staff of Gen. N.B. Forrest, serving the confederacy until the end of hostilities in 1865.

Post war

Adair returned to Atlanta and resumed his real estate business. He began a political career which included positions on the

Atlanta City Council The Atlanta City Council is the main municipal legislative body for the city of Atlanta, Georgia, United States. It consists of 16 members primarily elected from 12 districts within the city. The Atlanta City Government is divided into three bo ...

and various committees. After co-founding the Atlanta Street Railway Company with Richard Peters in 1871 he began to develop areas at the same time they ran new streetcar lines to serve them: including West End and

Adair Park Adair Park is a residential neighborhood located southwest of downtown Atlanta. It has the form of a left curly bracket, bordered by the MARTA north–south rail line on the northwest, the BeltLine trail on the southwest and Metropolitan Parkway ...

. When the

panic of 1873 The Panic of 1873 was a financial crisis that triggered an economic depression in Europe and North America that lasted from 1873 to 1877 or 1879 in France and in Britain. In Britain, the Panic started two decades of stagnation known as the "Lon ...

came on he was compelled to make an assignment of all his property. In 1878, he sold his portion of the streetcar business to Peters. He started up again, becoming "connected" with the Atlanta Cotton Factory (on the site of the current

CNN Center The CNN Center in Atlanta, Georgia, is the international headquarters of the Cable News Network (CNN). The main newsrooms and studios for several of CNN's news channels are located in the building. The facility's commercial office space is occu ...

) and the Atlanta Cotton Exposition. He was director of the Kimball House Company, president of the

Georgia Western Railroad The Georgia Pacific Railway was a railway company chartered on December 31, 1881, consolidating the Georgia Western Railroad and the Georgia Pacific Railroad Company of Alabama. The Georgia Western Railroad was chartered by the Georgia Legislatu ...

, and director of the

Piedmont Exposition The Piedmont Exposition of 1887 was the first exposition ever held in Piedmont Park in Atlanta, Georgia. Founding of the Piedmont Exposition Company The Piedmont Exposition Company was founded in June 1887 by a group of men who met in the office ...

. In the 1880s, real estate boomed again and with his sons, he established Adair and Company to develop suburban properties. With John W. Grant, in 1881 he developed what would become

Stockbridge, Georgia Stockbridge is a city in Henry County, Georgia, Henry County, Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia, United States. As of the 2010 United States Census, 2010 census the population was 25,637, up from 9,853 in 2000. Stockbridge is part of the Atlanta metr ...

. He also helped raise funds for the rebuilding of the Kimball House after it burned down. Later projects with Kimball failed: the subdivision of

Peters Park Peters Park may refer to: * Peters Park (Atlanta), a failed project to build one of Atlanta's first garden suburbs, now the site of the Georgia Tech campus * Peters Park (Boston), a neighborhood in Boston Boston (), officially the City of ...

in 1887 and the establishment of

Kimball, Tennessee Kimball is a town in Marion County, Tennessee, United States. The population was 1,545 at the 2020 census and 1,395 in 2010. It is part of the Chattanooga, TN– GA Metropolitan Statistical Area. History Kimball was founded in 1890 as a mo ...

in 1890 both of which he auctioneered.

Personal life

Adair married Mary Jane Perry 7 Jun 1854, in Newton County, Georgia. Adair died at the age of 76,"Find A Grave Index," database, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:QVKZ-T4X4 : 6 August 2020), George Washington Adair, ; Burial, Atlanta, Fulton, Georgia, United States of America, Westview Cemetery; citing record ID 44291841, Find a Grave, http://www.findagrave.com. leaving his wife, and six children: Jack, Forrest,

George George may refer to: People * George (given name) * George (surname) * George (singer), American-Canadian singer George Nozuka, known by the mononym George * George Washington, First President of the United States * George W. Bush, 43rd Presiden ...

, Sallie, Annie and Mary. Adair was first cousin to Green B. Adair, another Atlanta real estate developer.

References

* ''New Men, New Cities, New South: Atlanta, Nashville, Charleston, Mobile, 1860-1910'' (1990), Don Doyle, University of North Carolina Press, p. 99 {{DEFAULTSORT:Adair, George History of Atlanta 1823 births 1899 deaths People from Morgan County, Georgia People from Covington, Georgia Businesspeople from Atlanta 19th-century American businesspeople American real estate businesspeople