A decade under Atlanta’s influence

Signature events of the 1970s in Atlanta

AJC
Wednesday, December 31, 2008

1970

January
Atlanta’s first Jewish mayor, Sam Massell, takes office.
May
After 50 years of work, Stone Mountain’s Confederate Memorial carving is completed.
More than 1,000 revelers participate in the Ramblin’ Raft Race down the Chattahoochee River, one year after a group of Georgia Tech students started what would become a 70s phenomenon.
October
Muhammad Ali returns from forced exile, fighting Jerry Quarry at the old Municipal Auditorium.
November
Jimmy Carter is elected governor.

1971
March
Atlanta Municipal Airport is renamed to honor former Mayor William B. Hartsfield, who was instrumental in making the city a transportation hub.
July
Hartsfield Airport becomes international, with Eastern Airlines acquiring a nonstop route to Mexico City.
September
The city’s water department is desegregated in accordance with new guidelines that set a goal of 50 percent minority participation in all municipal enterprises.
November
A referendum to fund MARTA via a 1-cent sales tax passes in Fulton and DeKalb and is rejected in Gwinnett and Clayton.
The National Hockey League awards Atlanta an expansion team, the Flames. Though they would make the playoffs six out of eight years, plummeting ticket sales and rising costs force team owner Tom Cousins to sell the team to a Calgary businessman in 1980.

1972
February
MARTA buys the Atlanta Transit Company for $12.8 million.
August
Delta Air lines merges with Northeast Airlines.
September
Gwinnett County commissioners block a motion to give voters a second chance to fund MARTA.
October
The Omni complex, priced at $17 million, opens over the old railroad gulch.
November
Clayton voters again overwhelmingly reject participation in MARTA.
Andrew Young is elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, making him the South’s first black Congressman since Reconstruction.

1973
February
A settlement is reached in a lawsuit over Atlanta school desegregation requiring at least 30 percent black enrollment in all schools.
March
The state legislature approves a new charter for the City of Atlanta. The Board of Alderman and the position of Vice-Mayor are eliminated; a 18-person City Council is created, to be presided over by a City Council President.
July
Dr. Alonzo Crim becomes the first black superintendent of Atlanta Public Schools.
October
Maynard Jackson, the city’s last vice-mayor, is elected Atlanta’s first black mayor following a run-off against incumbent Sam Massell. The 35-year-old attorney won with 59 percent of the vote.

1974
February
Construction begins on MARTA’s first rapid transit line.
April
Atlanta Brave Hank Aaron breaks Babe Ruth’s all-time home run record, belting his 715th career homer at Atlanta (later Atlanta-Fulton County) Stadium.

1975
June
A deal is reached to preserve the Fox Theatre, which had nearly been demolished a year earlier to make room for Southern Bell’s new regional headquarters.
December
Atlanta voters reject a $10 million bond issue for sewers, drainage and street improvements.

1976
February
John Portman’s Peachtree Plaza opens as the world’s tallest hotel and Atlanta’s tallest building.
May
Billed as the world’s first indoor amusement park, the World of Sid and Marty Krofft has a splashy opening in the Omni International complex. Poor attendance, blamed on rising crime downtown, was blamed for the park’s closing six months later.
August
The $35 million Georgia World Congress Center opens, adjacent to the Omni. Atlanta soon becomes a major convention destination.
November
Former Georgia Gov. Jimmy Carter is elected president, defeating Gerald Ford.

1977
June
Mayor Jackson refuses to recognize the annual “Gay Pride” festival, instead proclaiming a “Liberties Day” honoring all minorities.
October
Jackson is elected to a second term as mayor.

1978
January
A fire destroys Atlanta’s historic Loew’s Grand Theater, site of the “Gone With the Wind” premiere 39 years earlier.
The Sex Pistols make their American debut at the Great Southeast Music Hall.
October
The Sweet Auburn neighborhood where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was born is named a national historic site.

1979
June
MARTA’s first rapid transit line, from Avondale to Georgia State Station, debuts.
July
The first two known victims in the Atlanta child murders are reported missing. Over the next two years 29 African-Americans — most of them male and adolescent — were killed.

Sources: AJC archives, “Days in the Life of Atlanta,” by Norman Shavin, “Atlanta Rising,” by Frederick Allen, The New Georgia Encyclopedia