12/20/07

MacRae's Hill

On the reader's inqury as to: Where, when, and how was Vining's Mt known as MacRae's Hill?

In Gov. Brown's marketing piece on Marietta and the W&A in the late 1800's, and on some Civil War summary maps reissued about the same time, Vinings Mt. is depicted as "MacRae's Hill." It seems anybody wanting to assign a name to the mountain can (i.e. Pace, Vinings, Wilkinson etc.). "MacRae" was likely William MacRae, a CSA General from North Carolina, who became a well liked superintendent of the W & A for a few years in the 1880's. The railroad also renamed one of it's engines from "Dalton" to the "Wm MacRae."


The timing of Gov. Brown's pamphlet map depicting "MacRae's Hill" allowed it to stick as a trivia footnote in history.

I Don't make this stuff up:

Ref: "Marietta the Gem of the W &A" Gov. J. Brown, Atlanta History Center Archives; Illustrated History of Atlanta, by E. Young pub 1877, p.133; Nashville, Chattanooga and St. Louis Railway: History and Steam Locomotives, By R. Prince, 2001,p.51