Callanwolde Fine Arts Center facts for kids
Quick facts for kids |
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Callanwolde
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| Location | 980 Briarcliff Rd., NE, Atlanta, Georgia |
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| Area | 11.9 acres (4.8 ha) |
| Built | 1917 |
| Architect | Henry Hornbostel |
| Architectural style | Late Gothic Revival |
| NRHP reference No. | 73002137 |
| Added to NRHP | April 23, 1973 |
Callanwolde Fine Arts Center is a special place in Atlanta, Georgia. It's a non-profit organization that offers fun classes and workshops for people of all ages. You can learn about art, writing, and music or theater here. Throughout the year, Callanwolde also hosts cool shows, art exhibits, and special events. They even help people in the community, like seniors, people with special needs, veterans, and families who need a little extra support.
The amazing house at Callanwolde was built by Charles Howard Candler. He was the president of The Coca-Cola Company for a few years and also led the board of Emory University for a long time. Charles Howard Candler was the oldest son of Asa Griggs Candler, who started The Coca-Cola Company. Callanwolde is a beautiful mansion built in the Gothic-Tudor style. It sits on a large 12.5-acre property and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, which means it's a very important historical site.
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Who Supports Callanwolde?
Callanwolde Fine Arts Center gets help from different groups. The DeKalb County government provides support, especially through their Parks, Recreation & Cultural Affairs department. The Georgia Council for the Arts also helps out. This council is a partner with the National Endowment for the Arts, which is a big organization that supports art across the United States.
The Candler Family Story
Callanwolde was the home of Charles Howard Candler and his family from 1920 to 1959. Charles Howard Candler, often called Howard, was born in 1878 and passed away in 1957.
Howard's father, Asa Griggs Candler, was a pharmacist in Atlanta. In 1891, Asa bought the secret recipe for Coca-Cola. The drink was first created in 1886 by another Atlanta pharmacist, John Stith Pemberton, as a health tonic.
Howard Candler went to public schools in Atlanta. He later earned a degree from Emory College, which was a Methodist school located in Oxford, Georgia at the time. In 1895, while he was in Oxford, his father sent him a barrel of Coca-Cola syrup. Howard shared it with his classmates, and that was the first time Coca-Cola was ever seen in Oxford!
After college, Howard studied medicine for a few years. Much later, in 1942, he received an honorary law degree from Emory University, which had moved to Atlanta by then.
In 1903, Howard Candler married Flora Harper Glenn. They had three children: Charles Howard Jr., Catherine Harper, and Mary Louisa.
The Candlers, Coca-Cola, and Emory University
Emory University is often called "Coca-Cola U" because the Candler family and The Coca-Cola Company have given so much support to the school over the years.
In 1914, Emory College decided to move from Oxford to Atlanta. Atlanta's Chamber of Commerce promised a lot of money if the new Emory University would come to the city. In 1915, Asa Griggs Candler, Howard's father, donated a huge amount of money to the university.
In 1915, Henry Hornbostel was chosen to design the new Emory campus in the Druid Hills area of Atlanta. The next year, Howard Candler became the president of Coca-Cola. This meant he would now be the main supporter of Emory University. Work on his new home, Callanwolde, started the following year, close to the Emory campus. Henry Hornbostel, who designed Emory, also designed Callanwolde.
Howard Candler became the chairman of Emory University's board in 1929 and stayed in that role until he passed away in 1957. He continued his family's tradition of giving generous financial support to the university. For example, in 1947, he gave the university assets worth more than $15 million.
Two years after Howard Candler's death, his wife gave the Callanwolde estate, including many of its original furnishings, to Emory University. Emory later sold the property to the First Christian Church. Then, in 1971, people in DeKalb County worked together to buy Callanwolde and save it.
The Name "Callanwolde"
The name "Callanwolde" comes from a family story. The Candler family believed that one of their ancestors, William Candler, was an officer in Cromwell's army in the 1600s. He fought in Ireland and was given land in a place called Callan, in County Kilkenny. He moved his family there and lived at Callan Castle. The name "Callanwolde" combines "Callan" with "wolde," an old English word for "woods."
So, the name Callanwolde connects the family's history in Ireland with the beautiful wooded land where the mansion stands.
The Callanwolde estate is located in the Druid Hills neighborhood of Atlanta. This area was designed by the famous landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted, who also designed Central Park in New York City. The Callanwolde property originally had 27 acres, but about 12 acres remain today. The grounds have lovely sculptured lawns, formal gardens, nature trails, and a rock garden. They are cared for by DeKalb County.
The Callanwolde Mansion
The Callanwolde mansion was designed by Henry Hornbostel, the same architect who designed Emory University. The house has an open design, with most rooms connecting to large halls on each floor. The entire mansion is huge, about 27,000 square feet, and it's built around a central courtyard that is now enclosed.
You can see the amazing craftsmanship everywhere in the house. There's beautiful walnut wood paneling, colorful stained glass, and bronze railings. The ceilings and fireplaces have delicate designs, and there's even hidden artwork that covers the pipes of the Aeolian organ.
Callanwolde was the Candler family's home for 39 years. In 1959, Howard Candler's wife gave the estate, along with many of its original furnishings, to Emory University.
Later, the First Christian Church bought the house (but not the furnishings). They sold off parts of the property. For a while, an artist leased the mansion to open an art gallery, but during that time, the house started to fall apart. Some organ pipes were damaged, a fire caused damage to a bedroom floor, and light fixtures and other parts were stolen. Eventually, the church decided to sell the remaining 12 acres, which included the mansion, a carriage house, a gardener's cottage, greenhouses, and other small buildings.
To save Callanwolde from being destroyed, people in the community started a fundraising effort. A group called The Callanwolde Foundation was formed. In 1972, they bought the property for $360,000, with help from a federal grant. DeKalb County contributed $40,000, took ownership of the property, and agreed to maintain it. Callanwolde was then placed on the National Register of Historic Places, and the Callanwolde Fine Arts Center opened. In 1983, The Callanwolde Foundation took over running the Fine Arts Center, while DeKalb County continues to take care of the house and grounds.
Recent History of Callanwolde
During the 1996 Summer Olympics held in Atlanta in 1996, Callanwolde was transformed into "Casa Italia." This was the official meeting place for the Italian Olympic Committee. Many famous guests attended parties there, including Prince Albert of Monaco, singer Luciano Pavarotti, and Olympic athletes.
Callanwolde has also been used as a filming location for several Hollywood movies. These include "Sharkey’s Machine," starring Burt Reynolds, and "Bear," a movie about the life of football coach Bear Bryant. In 2003, Callanwolde was a setting for scenes in the movie "Stroke of Genius, the Bobby Jones Story," starring Jim Caviezel.
Callanwolde is even mentioned in the novel "The Prince of Tides" by author Pat Conroy.
How Callanwolde Was Built
The mansion was built between 1917 and 1921. Its style is a modern take on the Gothic Revival style.
The front of the building has a medieval look with half-timbered designs on the upper floors. It also features castle-like battlements and Tudor arches. Even with these traditional Gothic elements, the design is simple and modern for the 20th century.
The house was built using strong materials like poured concrete and steel. The base is made of rubble covered by stucco, and it sits on a two-foot concrete foundation.
All the wooden floors are securely attached to timbers set in concrete. This strong construction means the building hasn't settled or shifted over time. The downstairs floors are made of walnut wood, except for the living room, which has white oak floors. The upstairs floors are also white oak. The house also features large wooden beams and walnut paneling.
Callanwolde has a central heating system with hidden units behind decorative metal screens. It was originally heated by steam using coal, but it was changed to gas heat in the 1930s. The house also had a built-in vacuum system, but it no longer works. There was also a buzzer system with a control panel in the kitchen, but that's gone now. The pipes for the Aeolian organ are built into the house's structure in four different rooms.
Callanwolde’s Architect: Henry Hornbostel
Callanwolde was designed by architect Henry Hornbostel (1867-1961) from Pittsburgh. Hornbostel was born in Brooklyn, New York, and studied architecture at Columbia University in New York City and the famous Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris.
He started working in Pittsburgh in 1904 after winning a competition to design the campus that is now Carnegie Mellon University. He also started the Department of Architecture at Carnegie Tech. Besides his own architecture business, he taught at Columbia University and worked with several firms in New York.
Even though most of his work was in Pittsburgh, Hornbostel designed projects all over the country. He created campus plans for Carnegie Tech, Emory University in Atlanta, and Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. He also designed several bridges in New York City and government buildings in Albany, NY and Oakland, CA.
One of his most famous and lasting designs is the Williamsburg Bridge (1903) in New York City. This bridge connects Manhattan to Brooklyn. It took over seven years to build. When it opened in 1903, it was the first all-steel, large suspension bridge built in the country, and it was the longest of its kind in the world until the 1920s.
Henry Hornbostel likely met Howard Candler through a project for The Coca-Cola Company. In 1915, he designed the overall plan for Emory University when it moved to Atlanta.
Hornbostel's designs often used ideas from older styles like Gothic, Tudor, and Renaissance. However, his work also showed early signs of modern design, with simpler shapes and less decoration. This makes his work a bridge between the older styles of the 1800s and the modern architecture of the 1900s.
You can find drawings and plans by Henry Hornbostel at the Carnegie Mellon University Libraries. Information about his original design for the Emory University Campus is kept in the University Library's Special Collections.
Images for kids
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The beautiful Callanwolde Mansion.
