- Park
- Segregation
- 1919
- City of Atlanta
- Location approximate
Washington Park (1919), the first park for Black Atlantans
Opened in 1919 as the first recreational park for African Americans in Atlanta, in Heman Perry's new Black middle-class neighborhood west of Ashby Street.
The record
Black developer Heman Perry, who founded the Standard Life Insurance Company in 1913, took over three subdivision plats west of Ashby Street that white developers had abandoned and developed them for Black homebuyers; before 1919 Ashby Street had served as a color line. The park was designated for Black residents in 1919, the first in the city, and was built out between 1919 and 1928, growing from a 6.57-acre gift to 25 acres. Over time it included a swimming pool, dance hall, pavilions and tennis courts; the pool was lost when MARTA's Ashby station was built in 1976. The neighborhood's houses, built 1919–1958, were listed on the National Register as the Washington Park Historic District in 2000.
Today: Washington Park and its natatorium and tennis center, off Martin Luther King Jr. Dr and Joseph E. Lowery Blvd.