In a neighborhood with too many significant, historic homes to list, 52 West Brookhaven Drive stands out.
And that’s without including the extent of the property on which it sits.
The historic home is directly across the street from the entrance to the Capital City Country Club, which is said to have been the first planned golf community in the state of Georgia. It originally opened in 1911 as Brookhaven Country Club.
Susan Traynor’s white, clapboard house was already there by then. Built in 1898, it is thought to be the oldest, continuously lived-in home in historic Brookhaven.
With a large, inviting front porch it has many unique features, including solid Mahogany doors that are original to the house. The floors, also original, are long (30-feet long in several places), thin strips of oak, with gorgeous inlay flourishes in the corners. The windows and the rooms are large. The ceilings are 10 feet, five inches high.
Along the driveway is a handsome brick retaining wall that is all but hidden. It curves around into the backyard, creating a small terrace, with stairs leading to an outdoor patio unearthed in the 1960s.
While the house faces the country club, it is also a corner lot, with 204 feet of frontage on Capital City Lane.
The home was occupied during World War I by one of the commanding officers of Camp Gordon, an 800 acre cantonment that was completed in September of 1917, just a few months after the United States entered the first World War.
As such, the house has a few additional interesting features, like a side door from the living room that leads outside. That is because enlisted men were not permitted to walk through the front door of the house but were occasionally invited to join the commanding officer and other officers at gatherings.
Camp Gordon was built on what was known as the Cross Keys site on land owned by Asa G. Candler, Samuel C. Dobbs and Henry R. Durand. Other possibilities for the cantonment included the Atlanta race track, also owned by Candler, which today is Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport.
Camp Gordon comprised 1,400 buildings and cost $6 million.
Among the troops based there were the 82nd Rainbow Division, 157th Depot Brigade, the 514th, 516th, 517th, 518th and 539th Engineer Service Battalions and the 17th Infantry Brigade. In all, 6,153 officers and 227,312 enlisted men moved through the campus during the great war. The camp was named in honor of Georgia Governor, Senator and Soldier John B. Gordon.
There is a historic marker at DeKalb-Peachtree Airport about Camp Gordon, which operated from 1917 to 1920.
Following the war, Bubba Irby purchased the house. Some of his grandchildren still remember visiting.
The house at 52 West Brookhaven Drive is on the market. Click on the link in the first sentence to learn more about the house or leave a question below.
