Remembering by Doing at Kittredge Park

Perhaps it was meant to be like this: Sept. 11, 2011, a beautiful, clear, hot day in Atlanta, the kind of day that tells people to get out and do something, make something, be something. In this case, Friends of Kittredge Park, Hands on Atlanta and Emory University teamed up to spend this solemn day cleaning up Kittredge Park, getting it closer to the envisioned structure and uses of the area.

Kittredge Park is hidden down a road that straddles the DeKalb International Student Center, formerly Kittredge Magnet School, on one side and Adams Stadium on the other. The bulk of the park, including a small pool and two baseball diamonds, is completely invisible from bustling North Druid Hills Road. The park is quiet, heavily forested and has a small tributary of the North Peachtree Creek in it.

Originally, the property was owned by the Johns family, A. Ellwyn and Laurie, who bought a 14-acre spread with North Druid Hills Road access in 1939 and built a house atop a hill on their land. They lived there until A. Ellwyn died in 1969 and Laurie died in 1984. Laurie was a passionate conservationist and wanted her property preserved, so she put restrictions on it preventing it from being developed into homes or similar.

For a while, part of the land was owned by the Atlanta Audubon Society and called the A. Ellwyn Johns Bird Sanctuary. In 2004, DeKalb County purchased that part as well as other tracts of land and assembled the 32-acre park as it is now.

Flo Wolf, president of the Merry Hills Neighborhood Association and member of Friends of Kittredge Park, is very interested in improving the area.

“It’s basically untouched and hasn’t been maintained,” she said.

She explained how today’s park cleanup efforts can help it reach the goals set out in the master plan. The master plan is in its first phase and Wolf said they still need about $300,000 to complete it. The first phase concentrates on creating infrastructure like trails and signs.

“The thing that’s close to my heart is phase two,” she said. “It includes a playground for the Merry Hills side of the park near Holly Lane. That’s closest to my heart because we have so many children in the neighborhood and we don’t have a public playground. It’s two miles away from the nearest playground.”

In addition to nature trails and stone trails, the master plan includes a community garden near the playground, picnic shelters, an open field for various uses, waterfalls with observation decks, gazebos and areas for bird-watching.

Flocks of Emory University students were volunteering, hauling away brush, clearing mulch and setting up the planned trails.

Caitlin Keesee is a fellow for Volunteer Emory and lives in the Turman Hall dorm. She brought along a fleet of orange-clad fellow Turman residents to help.

Turman Hall, built to LEED certification standards, is known for its green initiatives, according to an Emory Magazine article describing its features. During its construction, 78 percent of construction waste was recycled. Most of the flooring is bamboo and the carpeting has a high recycled fiber content. The building features Energy Star appliances and recycling rooms, it uses 30 percent less water than a comparable structure and there is an energy consumption monitor publicly visible in the lobby. (The monitor's readouts can also be seen here.)

Along with another group of students, there were about 140 volunteers representing Emory, Keesee said. Many of the volunteers also worked yesterday.

“It just makes me really happy,” she said. “It’s nice that they’re taking time out of their day to sort of reflect and remember.”

As the volunteers worked diligently, pausing for water and snacks every so often, they laughed, joked and sang songs like Whistle While You Work and Hakuna Matata. Birds chirped, the sky stayed mostly clear and all in all, it felt like a beautiful day to reflect, remember and make the community better.