Atlanta Real Estate > Brook-haven
Atlanta Communities: Brook-haven
Originally developed around 1910 as Atlanta's first country club neighborhood, Brookhaven, located on the northern edge of Buckhead is an enclave of large, elegant Tudor, Colonial, Georgian and English cottage homes. Lush landscapes, beautiful arrays of gardens, and meandering streets are indicative of Brookhaven. In the 1980s, this area was placed on the National Register of Historic Places. Solomon Goodwin, the area's first white settler, homesteaded this area in the early 1830s. The Goodwin home and a small graveyard at 3931 Peachtree Road were once a landmark for Federal troops closing in on Atlanta during the Civil War. The home is the oldest extant house in DeKalb County. Home to the elite Capital City Country Club on East Brookhaven and Club Drive; the area surrounding the golf course is a Mecca for walkers, joggers and bike riders. Minutes away from Buckhead's nightlife, the theatre, divine eateries and the shopping experiences of Perimeter Mall, Lenox Square and Phipps Plaza. This neighborhood is a haven for the established and upwardly mobile professional. Easy accessibility to all major expressways and Brookhaven and Lenox Marta stations.
Brookhaven
Originally conceived as a golf club community in 1910, Brookhaven is a natural mix of early 20th century historic homes and cute 40's bungalows alongside new townhome and cluster home communities. As the northern neighbor of Buckhead, it offers the convenience of Atlanta but with a less urban character. The residential areas are within easy walking distance to shopping, dining and Marta mass transit.It should not surprise anyone with even the smallest knowledge of Atlanta history that the Brookhaven area along Peachtree Road has developed rapidly in recent decades.
Located just north of Buckhead along the Fulton County and DeKalb County line, the sprawling neighborhood is home of a large train station in MARTA's rapid transit system, a grand country club development west of Peachtree dating from 1910, Oglethorpe University, numerous apartment communities and proliferating strip malls.
This and all the area between Brookhaven and the Central Business District have formed one of the most popular routes for prestige development since the days preceding the Cotton States Exposition of 1885.
From the beginning, the history of Brookhaven has been part of the history of DeKalb County. Before 1821 the land now in DeKalb County was a wilderness. The Creek Indians used it as a hunting ground and as "no-man's" land between their tribes and the war-like Cherokees north of the Chattahoochee River. In 1821, a treaty was made by the U.S. government with the Creek nation and the land in DeKalb County was dispersed by lottery to settlers. Some of the people who settled did so at a crossing of rough trails, which became known as Cross Keys. The site of old Cross Keys was located at a road junction near the Peachtree Golf Club and Nancy Creek Crossing.
What is now the business district of Brookhaven was once a small settlement known as "Goodwin's," presumably named after Solomon Goodwin, who built his home in 1831 at what is now 3967 Peachtree St. The house is still standing but is now located at 3931 Peachtree St., behind the family cemetery and by the present Steak Out restaurant. It is the oldest extant house in DeKalb County and was used to house Federal troops during the Civil War.
During the first two decades of this century, wealthy Atlantans began to build summer homes and estates around Buckhead and in the area known as Brookhaven. In 1910 the Mechanical and Manufacturers Club purchased 150 acres for the Brookhaven Country Club to include a lake, clubhouse, golf course and exclusive homes. Since many of the members of this Club also belonged to the prestigious Capital City Club, it was a logical step for that organization to purchase the Brookhaven Country Club for its own use in 1913.
Soon, the planned construction of grand homes started on the carefully laid out, curvilinear streets of the neighborhood. Some of Atlanta's wealthiest citizens moved to the development, their homes designed by the city's leading architects, including Neel Reid, A.F.N. Everett, and Pringle and Smith. The present clubhouse was built in 1927 in the Norman Revival style by Prestons Stevens. The golf course architect at Brookhaven, as well as for the Druid Hills golf course, was Herbert Barker of Garden City, Long Island.
In the 1980s, the Capital City Country Club development became a National Register Historic District as the first "planned early 20th-century suburb conceived as a golf-course/country club community." Significant development in Brookhaven continued in 1915 when Oglethorpe University reopened on land just north of the present MARTA station after being closed since the Civil War.
Most of the facility's oldest buildings were designed by Morgan and Dillon, one of Atlanta's oldest and best known architectural businesses. In the early 1900s, a commercial district began to grow along Peachtree Road to serve the increasing residents around the club and others moving to the surrounding neighborhood. In 1936 a community movie theatre opened with the film "Heidi" and by 1950 stores included a shoe store, drug store, hardware, filling station and an A&P grocery store.
In the 1970s Peachtree Rd. was widened to six lanes and the gentle curve of that thoroughfare in the Brookhaven community was straightened. Older businesses were eliminated by the expansion. Afterwards, the heavy rail lines and accompanying train station for MARTA came to occupy almost all of the land on the east side of Peachtree Rd.
As in virtually all other growth around Atlanta in this century, it was development of new means of transportation such as streetcars and automobiles that brought about the most change. These innovations in transport made it possible for areas like Brookhaven to emerge in the first place. The street scenes in parts of Atlanta, like Brookhaven, show the results of these ever present pressures of growth.
History
The first residents of the Town of Brookhaven were Algonkian-speaking Native Americans, the Setalcots (or Setaukets), and the Unkechaugs. The boundaries of the Town of Brookhaven coincide almost exactly with the tribal lands of these two groups or "tribes."
English settlers arrived on the north shore of the Town in 1655. The six men, from the Town of Southold, purchased eight square miles stretching from Stony Brook to Port Jefferson in exchange for tools, wampum, lead, powder and "1 pair of children's stockings." The first settlers came from eastern Long Island and New England. The Town was originally called Ashford, and later Brookhaven, the first settlement was named after the native Americans it was purchased from: Setauket. More land purchases followed over the years. In 1666, after Long Island became a part of the Colony of New York, Governor Richard Nicholl granted a Patent, which fixed the name of Brookhaven, confirmed title to the lands already purchased, and allowed for additional purchases. In 1686, Governor Thomas Dongan issued a Patent which granted extensive powers to the Town, and established a representative form of government.
Early Brookhaven residents were engaged in farming, fishing and whaling. In the 1800s, the shipbuilding, and the cordword industries became important as well. Many of our early residents held important roles in the formation of the state and the nation.
Geography
Brookhaven Town as we know it today, is the result of glacier deposits and erosion that began about fifteen million years ago. The place where a glacier stops moving south and begins to melt is called a "terminal moraine," and is usually hilly and rocky. Brookhaven has two such moraines: running east to west along the center of the Town is the Ronkonkoma Moraine. Bald Hill is a part of this area. Along the north shore, the hills, rocky areas and cliffs that face the Long Island Sound are part of the Harbor Hills Moraine. The glaciers also created large holes, known as "kettleholes," which filled with water, forming Lake Ronkonkoma, the largest lake in Suffolk County, Artist Lake, Spring Lake (both in Middle Island), Lake Panamoka in Ridge, and others. The outwash plain that formed the South Shore of Brookhaven, resulted when the water from the melting glacier carried sand and gravel from the morianes, building up a wide sandy plain. Many streams and ponds formed in this area, including two of Suffolk's rivers, the Peconic and Connecticut (or Carmans), both of which are located within the Town. The north and south shores are tall timber areas, covered mostly with oak and maple. The middle section of is called the "Pine Barrens," with stands of scrub oak and scrub pine. This is an important area for replenishing our water supply through a process called "water recharge." Long Island is one of the few areas in the United States that obtains its water solely from the underground aquifer. The vegetation of the Pine Barrens filters the water which percolates down through layers of cleansing sand.
The barrier beaches, situated between the various bays and the Atlantic Ocean, from Brooklyn to Southampton, are constantly charging, due to the action of winds and waves. During severe storms new inlets may be opened and old inlets to the bays may be closed. These barrier beaches or islands provide protection for the south shore of Long Island.