Dr. Joseph Thompson (September 29, 1797 in

Spartanburg County, South Carolina Spartanburg County is a county located on the northwestern border of the U.S. state of South Carolina. As of the 2020 census, the population was 327,997, making it the fifth-most populous county in South Carolina. Its county seat is Spartanburg ...

– August 21, 1885) was an early

settler A settler is a person who has migrated to an area and established a permanent residence there, often to colonize the area. A settler who migrates to an area previously uninhabited or sparsely inhabited may be described as a pioneer. Settl ...

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 ...

Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States Georgia may also refer to: Places Historical states and entities * Related to the ...

, doctor,

hotelier A hotel manager, hotelier, or lodging manager is a person who manages the operation of a hotel, motel, resort, or other lodging-related establishment. Management of a hotel operation includes, but is not limited to management of hotel staff, bu ...

, and real-estate investor.

Biography

Beginnings

Born to a

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

-bred family in

, he practiced medicine as a youth. He moved to the new town of Decatur, where he married Mary Ann Tomlinson Young in 1827. He ran a stagecoach between the state capital, Milledgeville, and

Tuscumbia, Alabama Tuscumbia is a city in and the county seat of Colbert County, Alabama, United States. As of the 2010 census, the population was 8,423. The city is part of The Shoals metropolitan area. Tuscumbia was the hometown of Helen Keller, who lived at ...

, by way of Decatur, where he kept an inn. He was an important man in town, friend of Judge

William Ezzard William E. Ezzard (June 12, 1799March 24, 1887) was a Southern United States politician who served as the 11th, 13th and 19th Mayor of Atlanta, Georgia, in the 19th century. Ezzard was born in Abbeville, South Carolina. He moved to Georgia and l ...

and John Glen (both future mayors of Atlanta), and was entrusted by the citizenry to make sure that the terminus of the

Western & Atlantic Railroad The Western & Atlantic Railroad of the State of Georgia (W&A) is a railroad owned by the State of Georgia and currently leased by CSX, which CSX operates in the Southeastern United States from Atlanta, Georgia, to Chattanooga, Tennessee. It was fo ...

not be their little town. As Terminus (and later Marthasville and still later Atlanta) grew, the

Georgia Railroad Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States Georgia may also refer to: Places Historical states and entities * Related to the ...

built a brick hotel building for railroad workers and asked Thompson to run it.

Atlanta

He and his family arrived in recently founded Atlanta in 1845. He ran the Atlanta Hotel until its destruction after the

Battle of Atlanta The Battle of Atlanta was a battle of the Atlanta Campaign fought during the American Civil War on July 22, 1864, just southeast of Atlanta, Georgia. Continuing their summer campaign to seize the important rail and supply hub of Atlanta, Un ...

. The Atlanta Hotel was the largest and best hotel in town at the time and he was known as a genial host. His witticisms there were often quoted in the "Editor's Drawer" feature of '' Harper's Magazine''. He had many residents there including Atlanta's first mayor Moses Formwalt (whose estate Thompson later administered) and

Alexander H. Stephens Alexander Hamilton Stephens (February 11, 1812 – March 4, 1883) was an American politician who served as the vice president of the Confederate States from 1861 to 1865, and later as the 50th governor of Georgia from 1882 until his death in 1 ...

(who was stabbed at the hotel in 1848 by Judge Francis H. Cone). The Thompsons' eldest child, Mary Jane, married Richard Peters in 1848. Mrs. Thompson died at their Atlanta home in 1849 and he remarried in 1851. His second wife died three years later. He married a third time in 1858 and remained with that woman until her death in 1878. He owned many important parcels of land in the young city including the future location of the

SunTrust Bank SunTrust Banks, Inc. was an American bank holding company with SunTrust Bank as its largest subsidiary and assets of US$199 billion as of March 31, 2018. The bank's most direct corporate parent was established in 1891 in Atlanta, where it was ...

building at Five Points. In 1850 he was on the committee that brought the town its first agricultural fair, the Fifth Annual Fair of the Southern Central Agricultural Association, which was held at newly purchased land at the end of Fair Street (now Memorial Drive). After the Civil War, he sold $70,000 worth of real estate including the site of his hotel where the Kimball House was later built. In 1867, when General Pope of the

Third Military District The Third Military District of the U.S. Army was one of five temporary administrative units of the U.S. War Department that existed in the American South. The district was stipulated by the Reconstruction Acts during the Reconstruction period fo ...

ordered election committees to oversee changes in voter status, Pope named Thompson to head the committee for Atlanta. At the time of his death in 1885 aged 87, he was president of the Medical College in Atlanta and still resided on Pryor Street.

References

* Black, Nellie Peters, ''Richard Peters'', 1904, Foote & Davies Company * Garrett, Franklin, ''Atlanta and Environs'', 1954, University of Georgia Press {{DEFAULTSORT:Thompson, Joseph Pioneers of Atlanta 1797 births 1885 deaths