Brian O’Malley (right) and “sherpa” Alex Clark at rest before O’Malley had to be rescued short of completing his Mt. Everest quest. All photos/video courtesy Brian O’Malley
He and his team of expert “sherpas” made the climb in late April, after he made an initial trip with his brother-in-law in February.
O’Malley tied his quest to fundraising for the Tunnel to Towers Foundation, which provides mortgage-free homes for the families of fallen first responders, Gold Star families, and catastrophically injured veterans and first responders. (If you’d like to donate, you can do so by clicking here.)
After arriving in Nepal on April 15, O’Malley needed some medication, but it came with a very bad side effect—he lost his appetite and wasn’t eating much at all as the journey got underway
As the trek continued, O’Malley lost 20 pounds and “considerable strength.” Eventually he had to be rescued by one of his sherpas and hospitalized in Kathmandu before returning to the United States.
Speaking in mid-May, as he was still recovering at his daughter’s home in Norfolk, Va., O’Malley’s voice was cracking a bit as reflected on what he called “the experience of a lifetime.”
His quest to become the third-oldest man to scale the tallest point in the world came up short, but he said that the lessons he drew from the expedition were deeply profound.
“I’m glad I did it and I had the opportunity to do it,” O’Malley told East Cobb News.
O’Malley awaiting rescue after growing weak from not having an appetite.
He said he was grateful to be able to keep his promise to his family to survive—although he and his crew passed a sobering graveyard of Everest’s climbing victims along the way.
“If I had continued one more day, I may not be talking to you. I had no problem with the altitude. I just could not eat without feeling very nauseous.”
As O’Malley was walking to his rescue helicopter, he fell through an icy crevice on an unmarked trail and had to be pulled out by two of his sherpas.
Looking up from 22,000 feet, he could see Mt. Everest (elevation 29,031 feet), but knew that’s as far as he would get.
“The summit was right there, and I wanted to feel like I could get through it.”
As O’Malley admitted in the video below, however, when he was taken away, “it didn’t feel heroic, it felt hollow. Sometimes the bravest thing you can do is to stop—not because you’re weak, but because you know your limits.
“Anyone can be a sherpa to anybody at any time, to help people out, and at the same time to not be afraid to ask for help.”
A basecamp below the Everest peak.
O’Malley, who with his wife Shelley raised three children who graduated from Lassiter High School, said he wouldn’t say “never” to contemplating Everest again.
But he wants to spread the insights he gained from that experience to others, in speaking engagements and otherwise, “to help people go for their dreams and not let fear drive them.
“God gives us multiple lives and one death. It’s up to us in the days of our lives to spend them wisely.”
Again, if you want to support what was called the “Boomer Veterans and First Responders Mt Everest Summit Expedition 2025” and its continuing fundraising efforts for the Tunnel to Towers Foundation, you can donate here.
O’Malley tells more of his story in an excellent video below; please click the middle button to view the photo slideshow before that.
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William Tanks, Cobb Library Foundation treasurer, with (L-R) executive director Sandra Morris, vice president Nona Lay and board member Judy Boyce. Thursday’s tree dedication honored his late wife Lee Ann. Photos courtesy Cobb County Public Library System.
Submitted information and photos:
On Thursday, July 31st, the Cobb Library Foundation hosted a heartfelt tree dedication ceremony at the Sewell Mill Library & Cultural Center to honor the life and memory of Lee Ann Tanks. A Cherokee Brave Dogwood was planted in her name, a living tribute to a woman remembered for her unwavering faith, deep love for her family, and quiet, enduring service to the Cobb community.
Lee Ann (September 14, 1968 – June 7, 2025) spent over 24 years in public safety, serving as both a 911 dispatcher and a Fire Investigator Technician in the Fire Marshal’s Office. She was known for her strong but gentle spirit, and for a life guided by compassion, commitment, and kindness.
Among her greatest joys was being a mother to her son, U.S. Marine Justin Bradley Jean. Lee Ann was endlessly proud of him and poured her heart into raising him with faith and love.
Later in life, she married her soulmate, William “Bill” Tanks, City Manager of Mableton, GA– with her dearest friend Carla at her side as maid of honor. Bill, a dedicated member of the Cobb Library Foundation, became not only her loving husband and best friend, but a proud and caring bonus dad to Justin. Through their union, Lee Ann also gained three beloved bonus children: Eboni, Phillip (Catherine), and Naomi Tanks. Together, they built a life full of laughter, love, and cherished memories.
“Lee Ann was the kind of person who made everyone feel seen, supported, and loved,” said Sandra Morris, Executive Director of the Cobb Library Foundation. “She and Bill were longtime supporters of the Foundation, and it’s an honor to recognize her in a way that reflects the warmth, strength, and kindness she shared with others. Planting this tree is a lasting tribute to her legacy.”
To honor her as she lived—and as she wished to be remembered—the Cobb Library Foundation planted a tree in her name. The Cherokee Brave Dogwood, symbolic of strength, courage, and grace, now grows in the heart of the Sewell Mill Library grounds, offering a peaceful space for reflection and remembrance.
A touching moment during the ceremony came when Sandra Morris, Executive Director of the Cobb Library Foundation, shared an original poem written in Lee Ann’s memory:
YOU
Left us too soon, but you’re ever-present,
Every day. Always in our hearts, Never to be forgotten. Now rest in peace knowing that we’re
Thinking of you. And thankful to have known you. Not a person in the world like you!!
Knowing you made a difference,
Sweet friend.
The ceremony brought together family, friends, and library staff to celebrate her legacy. Through the growth of this tree, her spirit and values will continue to thrive in the very community she loved.
Tanks is a former Cobb County Director of Public Services.The newly planted tree honors the memory of his late wife Lee Ann, who died in June.Lee Ann Tanks was a 911 dispatcher and a Fire Investigator Technician in the Fire Marshal’s Office.
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Last week we heard from Brian O’Malley, a former East Cobb resident we talked to recently about his upcoming attempt to scale Mount Everest.
On Tuesday he began that journey to Nepal, and taped this message on his Facebook page before heading off.
He and his wife Shelley, who raised their three children here—all Lassiter High School graduates—recently relocated to the Northern Virginia area to be closer to them for the next couple of years.
O’Malley is using the trip with his brother-in-law to raise funds for the Tunnel to Towers Foundation, which provides mortgage-free homes for the families of fallen first responders, Gold Star families, and catastrophically injured veterans and first responders.
They’re calling it the “Boomer Veterans and First Responders Mt Everest Summit Expedition 2025” and they’ve raised more than $16,000 thus far, about two-thirds of their goal (you can donate here).
Here’s more about his “why” that he furnished to us, with details on his family’s long history of military service, including two of his three children. Luke O’Malley is currently attending the U.S. Naval Academy, like his parents and one of his sisters:
Why am I attempting to summit Mt Everest?
“Because it’s there.” Famous quote by early English Everest mountaineer George Mallory.
Since my latest successful back surgery about a year ago which has resulted in me feeling better than I have in 40+ years, I made a decision to attempt one of the ultimate physical and mental endeavors on this earth. I’ve always been enthralled by Mt Everest. The “records” of oldest Navy Veteran, top 10 oldest ever, etc, are also contributing factors that helped push me during training and helped me get both my physical body and my mind in a positive attitude and direction while attempting one of the most challenging endeavors out there, summiting Mt Everest.
Why do I want to support Tunnel to Towers Foundation, “T2T”?
Simple…T2T’s mission to assist first responders and our military when they are most in need for our support. Few really know exactly what our first responders and military personnel experience on a continuous basis, especially when extreme tragedy strikes them and their families. Frank Siller and T2T is the absolute best resource for these people in their deepest moments of need. There are so many examples of what T2T actually does for our National Heroes who protect us domestically and internationally that I hope to bring awareness to throughout my expedition to summit My Everest. I wholeheartedly want to bring continued awareness and financial support to this incredible helpful organization, T2T.
With the utmost humility and sincerity, God has blessed me and my life with so much; the most loving wife in the world, amazing kids and family, special loved ones, incredible friends, great leaders and some personal somewhat decent physical abilities. I feel that it is my obligation, while I still can, to do His will and to help those who need it most.
I’ve also been extremely blessed to have incredible parents, family, friends (especially my Aurora, IL buddies from elementary school, the “Click”, my teachers, squadron mates (especially my F-14 Tomcat Black Knight squadron mates), teammates, military and civilian leaders and peers whom have supported me and have offered continued encouragement during my life of service and always doing my very best with my God given talents. We have all experienced and know that life on this earth can be very fragile and God often calls his Angels (our loved ones and friends) at anytime…many times when we least expect it. I am so blessed and I truly believe that life on this earth is but a nanosecond in time and that we will all be together again in His Majesty’s Grace for Eternity. While I can, I want to continue to challenge the talents blessed upon me by God and do what I can to help those true heroes in our Nation whom protect all of us at home (first responders) and abroad (military service personnel).
What connection do I have to T2T?
T2T has been one of our family’s favorite charities mainly due to our immediate connection to the very people T2T supports. Namely:<
Myself: 1986 U.S. Naval Academy graduate, Naval Flight officer for approximately 10 years.
My wife of 35+ years, Shelley O’Malley: 1987 U.S. Naval Academy graduate, Naval Aviator for about 10 years. I owe everything to my wife, Shelley. She has always supported me and has been the “rock” of our family. Shelley, among other incredibly great life accomplishments, was the first female Aircraft Carrier Landing Signals Officer “LSO”. I could not do what I’m embarking on without the support of my beautiful, loving, caring, tough, dedicated (not enough positive acronyms to describe) love of my life! Shelley is the main reason that I can focus and do what I can to both challenge myself and to help others through organizations such as the Tunnel to Towers Foundation.
My children:
Shannon McKinney: U.S. Naval Academy “2015” Naval Academy recruit and “Academy Summer Seminar Attendee and candidate”; University of Georgia College All-American and 2 x National Champion; 2 x Olympic Trials Qualifier and World Ironman Triathlon Championship qualifier conducted in Helsinki, Finland.
Lauren O’Malley Stephenson: U.S. Naval Academy 2019 graduate and Brigade Commander (highest student leadership position at the Naval Academy); Naval Surface Warfare Officer; Served high-level Naval leadership in daily analysis of combat operations and readiness.
Luke O’Malley: U.S. Naval Academy Midshipman (Class of 2027) and future U.S. Naval Officer and Leader. of 2027)
Son-in-Law: Jared Stephenson, U.S. Naval Academy 2018 graduate and active Marine Corps Infantry Officer.
Father: James O’Malley, Retired Aurora / Chicago area Firefighter
Mother: Edna Mae O’Malley: Retired Nurse
Father-in-Law: James Laurilla, U.S. Airforce Veteran
Brother-in-Law: Steve McDaniel, U.S. Airforce Veteran, State of Georgia police officer and accompanied me on the approximate 100 mile trek through the Himalayas to Everest Base Camp. Steve is an incredible inspiration and high-achiever and loving husband to my sister, Kari McDaniel (a Naval and Airforce Officer spouse and nurse).
Best Man and Life Brother: Steve Wisotzki, 1986 U.S. Naval Academy graduate; U.S. Navy Special Operations (Seal)
Brother-In-Law: JP Aragon, U.S. Naval Aviator
Niece: Natalie Aragon, U.S. Naval Medical Nursing Corps Officer
Nephew: Camden Aragon, U.S. Naval Aviator
Special consideration and appreciation to our incredible lifelong community of friends in Marietta and Woodstock, Georgia, in the Chicago / Aurora area and the Norfolk / Virginia Beach, Virginia area, my loving family, teammates, squadron mates, professors, and much loved peers whom have always supported me and our family throughout our life’s journey.
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Brian O’Malley is also using his Mt. Everest expedition to raise money for the Tunnel to Towers Foundation, which assists veterans and first responders and their families with housing needs. (All photos and videos courtesy Brian O’Malley)
After trekking the equivalent of three or four marathons in a little more than a week near Mt. Everest, Brian O’Malley is back home the States, resting up for a return to attempt to reach the top of the world.
The long-time East Cobb resident admits to having been intrigued by the idea of climbing Everest before, and has watched many programs and videos of those who’ve aimed at reaching the peak of 29,032 feet above sea level.
But taking on such a plan for real was prompted by a physical challenge.
The 60-year-old former U.S. Navy aviator has always been up for daunting tasks. But after recovering from major back surgery—after decades of being in constant pain—he wanted to test his renewed body in a completely different way.
“My back hasn’t felt this good in my life,” O’Malley said earlier this week, a few days after his arrival back from Nepal. “And I’ve had that [Everest climb] in the back of my head.”
After convincing his wife he was up to the challenge, he and his brother-in-law Steve McDaniel made a preparatory visit earlier this month.
Brian O’Malley and brother-in-law Steve McDaniel during their trek near the Mt. Everest base camp earlier in March.
O’Malley will return in mid-April to join an elite, experienced Everest team to see how far high he can go. He would be the oldest Georgian to reach the top, and only the third person his age to do it.
“The goal is to get to the summit,” he said. “But not everyone can do that. My mindset is the summit.
If he can achieve that, he said, “all glory to God. If not, “at least I tried and gave it the best I have.”
His first trip to the Himalayas also served as the first phase of O’Malley’s fundraising effort for the Tunnel to Towers Foundation, which provides mortgage-free homes for the families of fallen first responders, Gold Star families, and catastrophically injured veterans and first responders.
They’ve nearly surpassed their initial goal of $15,000 in pledges and are accepting pledges for the second leg (you can donate here).
O’Malley is the son of a retired Chicago firefighter, and his brother-in-law is a police officer in Georgia. The O’Malley family—he and his wife Shelley and daughter Lauren are U.S. Naval Academy graduates, and son Luke is enrolled there now—is steeped in service.
(The O’Malley children all graduated from Lassiter High School.)
“Training for Life” has been his motto, extending to the Georgia Stingrays swimming team, based at the Mountain View Aquatic Center, and where his other daughter, Shannon (later a University of Georgia standout and All-American) nurtured her athletic talent.
“I’ve never stopped training,” O’Malley said. “I’ve always been physical.”
His preparations beforehand included incorporating a regimen that included plenty of leg squats, pullups, and other body motions to simulate “what I would be doing on the mountain.”
(The soundless video below shows O’Malley walking along an area near the basecamp.)
In his first trip, they reached the Everest base camp, at around 17,000 feet, to get acclimated to the altitude, testing equipment and learning all the details about making such a journey.
He donned an oxygen mask that made him look like Darth Vader, as he climbed incrementally, 2,000 or so feet at a time.
“It made you really concentrate on your breathing,” he said, admitting also that “it kind of caused a panic attack. The key was to work through that, to learn how to take deep breaths and think pleasant thoughts.”
But overall, he said, “we did good on our initial effort.”
O’Malley took most of this week off at the behest of the expedition leader, and will resume his workouts and preparations next week.
The expedition will last around 45-50 days, traversing more than 12,000 from the basecamp (there are four camps in all) to the top.
“It’s dangerous, but the sherpas know that mountain like the back of their hand,” O’Malley said. “They know what they’re doing. I feel like I’m in really good hands.”
If you’re interested in donating to the Tunnel to Towers Foundation, you can do so by clicking here.
Click the button in the middle to view the slide show, and check out the videos below that from O’Malley and McDaniel’s trip.
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Joe Gavalis was named the 2021 Distinguished Older Georgian by the Georgia Council on Aging.
Joe Gavalis, a retired federal law enforcement investigator who spearheaded the East Cobb Cityhood movement from 2018-22 and volunteered on a number of county and state boards, has died.
In a column in The Marietta Daily Journal on Thursday, retired Marietta Police Chief Dan Flynn announced the news and wrote a tribute to Gavalis, who was “leaving behind a distinguished legacy of dedicated servant leadership, patriotism and laudable good citizenship.”
Gavalis, who was 77, lived in the Chattahoochee Plantation area, was a member of the Cobb Neighborhood Safety Commission and the Cobb Elder Abuse Task Force.
He also created the North Georgia Task Force on Elder Abuse to expand senior advocacy around the state.
The Georgia Council on Aging, which named Gavalis its Distinguished Older Georgian in 2021, said in a message on its website that “through his decades of stellar services and support of older adults, Mr. Gavalis worked tirelessly to establish and promote programs, taskforces, and conduct training of law enforcement officers and civilians in the areas of Elder Abuse, Exploitation, Fraud, and neglect.”
Gavalis began an effort to create a city of East Cobb in late 2018.
Working with G. Owen Brown, of Retail Planning Corp., which owns Paper Mill Village and other retail and commercial real estate, Gavalis started the Committee for Cityhood in East Cobb, Inc.
But Gavalis was reluctant to speak publicly about the initiative, even during what eventually became an unsuccessful cityhood referendum in 2022. Initially, he didn’t want to divulge who was involved in the effort.
In his rare public comments, he said he was moved to pursue cityhood because “concerned citizens” had been asking about “the need for community zoning and variance issues to be determined by East Cobb citizens, and a growing dissatisfaction with the lack of police coverage.
“Indeed, there is a perception that county funds are not being spent prudently, and that public safety services and road improvements are not top priorities. If this concerns you in East Cobb, there is a solution. The answer is self-determination through cityhood!”
He also rarely spoke to the media, and brought on others to conduct public and town hall events.
The group also hired high-profile lobbyists to advocate for East Cobb cityhood in the Georgia legislature, but not all donors were revealed.
At the same time, Joe O’Connor, a member of an ad hoc review board appointed to review the proposed city’s financial feasibility study, resigned when he said Gavalis wouldn’t tell him who was all involved in the group.
At the end of 2019, the cityhood group said it would not be pursuing a referendum in the 2020 legislature.
But a new East Cobb cityhood group, the Committee for East Cobb Cityhood, formed in early 2021, again with Gavalis and Jones leading the way.
While Jones appeared in a pro-cityhood video, Gavalis remained in the background.
However, fierce opposition arose in the East Cobb Alliance, which engaged in debates and spoke against a referendum as a bill progressed in the legislature.
A May 2022 referendum passed the General Assembly, along with cityhood referendums in Lost Mountain and Vinings.
Gavalis continued his work on elder issues. In early 2022, he spoke frequently to seniors about protecting themselves from scammers, and from being victims of other crimes.
“Joe Gavalis had a larger-than-life attitude, an empathetic heart, and lived a life of service to Georgians, and the United States. Joe was dedicated to caring for and loving people, and for this we thank you,” the Georgia Council on Aging said.
In an AJC story in May 2024, Gavalis and Flynn were profiled, detailing the dozens of training sessions they held to assist law enforcement with combatting elder abuse.
In his MDJ column Thursday, Flynn wrote that “Georgia is a better place because of the love and dedication of Joe Gavialis. His legacy will live on in the hearts and minds of the thousands of lives he touched. He made them all better people, better guardians of the elderly and better Americans.”
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Carolyn Strickland lives near her older son James in the Lake Fjord community; her other son also resides in the East Cobb area. ECN photo.
Up until about a year ago, Carolyn Strickland was living the life of a near fully independent senior citizen.
That’s when her sons thought it best that she not drive any longer.
“I went anywhere I wanted to go,” says the 99-year-old mother of two, grandmother of five and great-grandmother of six.
Not long after that, she started using a walker to get around the living quarters her oldest son converted out of his garage in East Cobb’s Lake Fjord neighborhood.
“I was walking real good too,” she says, recalling outings with James Strickland Jr., at East Cobb Park, where a tree is dedicated to the memory of her 72-year marriage to her late husband.
Days away from her 100th birthday, nearly 40 friends and family members gathered at Copeland’s restaurant in Kennesaw to pay tribute to Strickland, who comes from a family with a history of nonagenarians.
On Tuesday, she will spend her 100th birthday with her sons and extended family. There’s some leftover birthday cake to enjoy, from Thursday’s party.
All of her eight sisters—she’s the baby of the family—lived at least to the age of 92. So did her mother.
Her husband, James Sr., a veteran of World War II and the Korean War and a recipient of the Distinguished Service Cross, was 94 when he died in 2017.
“I don’t know,” she said when asked what she attributes to her longevity. “Everybody asks me that.”
James Jr. thinks it’s in part due to the healthy food she cooked up for the family in Enterprise, Ala., where the Strickland family lived for 50 years.
“Turnip greens, cooked cabbage and spinach,” he says, admitting those are foods he can’t stand.
Carolyn and James Strickland Sr. when he was stationed in Hawaii after World War II. Strickland family photo.
“I’ll have to find another key to longevity,” says James, 75, a Georgia Tech graduate who sold computer systems for IBM and other technology companies.
Born Carolyn Bell Swain in Hazlehurst, Ga., on Dec. 24, 1924, she is the youngest of nine daughters.
Her father was a successful tobacco farmer in rural Jeff Davis County, but he died when she was eight.
Her mother (ironically named Mary Etta) moved the family into town for the rest of Carolyn’s childhood. After college, in the years following World War II, Carolyn followed some of her sisters to Atlanta.
It was there that she met a young Navy dive bomber, James Strickland, whose brother lived in her apartment building near what is now Pershing Point.
They married in 1946, as James was continuing a military career that included service in three branches.
Carolyn and her young sons while the family was stationed in North Carolina. Strickland family photo.
The following year, she boarded a ship in Norfolk, Va., with other military wives to visit their husbands stationed in Hawaii, traveling through the Panama Canal and then to San Francisco.
“We lived there two years; it was wonderful,” she said of her time in Hawaii. “It was so great. I was innocent and young.
“Then they gave us orders to return” stateside.
Carolyn gave birth to James and Steven while the family was stationed in North Carolina. James Sr. flew helicopters in Korea for the Army and the Marines, then was dispatched to Fort Rucker, Ala., close to the Florida panhandle, where the family relocated.
In Enterprise, James Sr. eventually became a helicopter pilot trainer. Carolyn settled in with family and community life. She helped found a Methodist church and served in lay leadership and even sang in the choir.
“Mom’s mottos are: Clean it, paint it, or throw it away, do it now, and how much is it?” James Jr. said.
Small-town life suited them well. Enterprise was like a “company” town for Fort Rucker (now named Fort Novosel). After her sons were in school, she worked as an administrative assistant to a school principal.
“We liked it and the children liked it,” she said of life there.
“Most everybody in town worked there,” James Jr. recalls. “We were all at the same economic level. You knew just everybody in town. We all knew each other.”
James Jr. stayed in metro Atlanta, and Steven soon followed, after a missionary career. He and his family reside in the Sprayberry High School area.
Carolyn, at 91, driving in the 2016 EAST COBBER parade, with her husband as a passenger, the year before he died. Strickland family photo.
In 2011, they convinced their parents to move to East Cobb. A few years earlier, James Sr. and Carolyn were enjoying their 61st anniversary dinner at the Georgian Terrace Hotel in Midtown when James Jr. persuaded the marquee manager at the Fox Theatre across the street to put their name up on the electronic sign.
They marked another anniversary by sponsoring a tree near the front parking lot at East Cobb Park, and have bricks with their names at The Strand Theatre in Marietta and Centennial Olympic Park in downtown Atlanta.
The Stricklands also observed their 70th anniversary by participating in the 2016 EAST COBBER parade. Carolyn, who was 91, drove with her husband as a passenger in their Cadillac convertible.
She still enjoys outings with her son eating out—”I have an excellent appetite,” she says—and playing bridge with several senior women, sometimes at Indian Hills Country Club.
Carolyn and James Sr. as the Fox Theatre marquee celebrates their 61st anniversary in 2007. Strickland family photo.
She regularly gets her hair and nails done, and admits that while she appreciates her sons waiting on her, “I really like to do my own thing.”
“My health is still good,” Carolyn says, elaborating on her many years. “I don’t really have an answer for it.”
A few minutes later, the phone rings. A neighbor is calling.
“This is the birthday lady. How are you?”
More company is expected soon, and she reflects yet again on the keys to having a long life.
“Good, clean living,” James Jr. says.
She says there really are no secrets at all.
“All I can tell you is I’ve had a good life. I haven’t had much of anything to worry about.”
In September, Carolyn and James. Jr. walking at East Cobb Park, where a tree behind them is dedicated to her 72-year marriage. Strickland family photo.
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To his patients in and around East Cobb, he’s Dr. Brian Nadolne. But in Kosovo this spring and summer, Lt. Col. Brian Nadolne served with the 48th Brigade of the Georgia National Guard.
Dr. Nadolne was part of a U.S.-led NATO group at Camp Bondsteel, teaching fellow medical professionals.
“It was overall a good experience, and I think I represented Northside really well,” he said. “I think the mission, which is basically to maintain peace there, was a huge success.”
“I said, ‘What else is there? What else can I do?’” He got his answer with the Georgia National Guard, where he found a leadership position that gave him the chance to represent fellow physicians.
“They needed family docs especially,” he said. “I joined and then in ’19 I was deployed to Iraq. I was in Camp Al Asad for three months and then a couple of years later, they needed me to go to Kosovo.”
While Dr. Nadolne was at Al Asad, the airbase sustained a ballistic missile strike in retaliation for the U.S. drone strike five days earlier that killed Iraq Maj. Gen. Qasem Soleimani, the head of the Quds force.
More than 100 troops were diagnosed with traumatic brain injuries as a result.
“That was scary,” Dr. Nadolne said. “We always had our weapons with us. That was a much different deployment. We were always under threat of trauma.
“Even though it was a combat mission (to Kosovo), there was never really threat of combat.”
At Bondsteel, Dr. Nadolne taught search-and-rescue operations and the importance of speaking to patients.
“Don’t just jump to technology,” he said. “Technology’s important but I think there’s an overreliance on it.”
And he said there are lessons in return for the American medical professionals who go overseas with the military, like him.
“I think Army medical in general teaches you to think outside the box,” Dr. Nadolne said. “God forbid we have a major problem here, like a terrorist attack, you already have doctors in the Georgia National Guard that are already doing a lot of field medicine, how to deal with triaging.
“It kind of keeps you on your toes, with the importance of the true practice of medicine.”
Dr. Nadolne also served as the de facto brigade surgeon for troops in the Balkans.
“That was really nice,” he said. “Here, back at the 48th, I had been a battalion surgeon back in Cumming. Now I’m going to be the brigade surgeon out of Macon. My role’s going to change to be a little more operational.”
Outside his Guard service, Dr. Nadolne sees patients at the practice at 1121 Johnson Ferry Road, Suite 100, in Marietta. He’s accepting new patients.
He thanked Dr. Amy Fallen and Rebecca Davis, CNP, for helping carry the load at home in his absence, as well as office manager Shalonda Burks and the East Cobb Family Medicine staff.
And Dr. Nadolne said Northside was supportive of his service.
“While I was gone, I nominated Steve Hudson (Northside’s director of physician and strategic development) for a Patriot Award,” Dr. Nadolne said. “I nominated him because I could not have done this without Steve Hudson. He supported me. He’s a former Marine. He supported me 100 percent, which means Northside supports me 100 percent.”
Dr. Nadolne said his work with the Guard is about more than seeing patients, but about serving Georgia.
“I feel like I represent Northside when I’m out there,” he said, “and I mean it.
“Because I treat patients like that, we’ve had a large influx of patients who’ve come because they’ve gotten to know me at the battalion level. I could not have done it without Northside and Steve Hudson.”
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It’s been a while since we dug seriously into some population numbers about East Cobb, noting back in 2017 (not long after the launch of East Cobb News) that the community had nearly eclipsed the 200,000 mark.
Following the release of some updated numbers this week by the Atlanta Regional Commission, we thought we’d revisit those figures, and they show the same levels of modest growth that’s been seen around the county.
The four East Cobb-area ZIP codes totaled 211,829 people, according to official data from the U.S. Census Bureau, which is expected to release a mid-decade update sometime in 2025.
Those figures do not include the Cobb County portion of 30075, which is estimated at around 8,500 people. The population of more than 56,000 lives mostly in the City of Roswell.
With that 30075 estimate, East Cobb’s population comes to around 220,000.
According to the ARC, Cobb County’s population is approaching 800,000, clocking in at 792,049. That’s the third-largest jurisdiction in metro Atlanta, behind Fulton County and Gwinnett County, with the later surpassing a population of one million for the first time.
The ARC estimates Cobb’s population will hit that same seven-figure threshold by 2050, although the county’s growth is slower than other areas, including Forsyth and Cherokee counties.
Here are the U.S. Census Bureau figures for the ZIP Codes in East Cobb—the links are for detailed profiles of each:
ZIP Code 30075: 56,161 (roughly 8,500 in East Cobb; the rest in the City of Roswell)
All of those numbers are up from our 2021 look, but the biggest jump is in 30066, which three years ago had a population of 55,937.
That’s in Northeast Cobb as well as the areas that include Town Center and Kennesaw State University.
You can look through specific ZIP Code data in the East Cobb area at this link; there is a wide range of data about demography, employment, education, housing, business and the economy, health and race and ethnicity.
A few tidbits to share about what’s in those profiles:
The average age across all East Cobb-area ZIP Codes is around 40 years old.
But East Cobb’s population also tends to be older than other parts of the county. Roughly 20 percent of those living in ZIP Code 30068 are 65 and older.
The median household income in those ZIP Codes averages out to be $111,000. The percentage of those with at least a bachelor’s degree averages out to be 59 percent, with 73 percent holding a college degree who live in ZIP Code 30068.
ZIP Codes 30062, 30066 and 30068 have roughly 17 percent of their populations speaking a language other than English at home. In ZIP Code 30067, that figure is nearly 30 percent.
The ARC updates its figures in April based on the previous year and releases them in July. The metro population now stands at more than 5,2 million people.
A couple interesting findings: In 2023, the metro employment base has grown 6.4 percent since the COVID-19 pandemic was declared in 2020, seventh highest in the nation.
But building permits in the 11-county region fell by 21 percent last year, with only 28,595 new residential units built.
“Current building permit activity remains lower than pre-Great Recession permit levels and fell below the 1980-2023 average annual level of 33,430,” the ARC concluded.
For more about the latest Atlanta Regional Commission snapshot figures, click here.
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Cobb Commissioner Jerica Richardson recently dedicated a new park-style bench in honor of the former owner of a popular Chevron gas station in East Cobb.
Her office on Wednesday released the accompanying photos and information about a celebration last week for Cicero Leonard “Lyn” Powell, who owned the Chevron station at the northwest intersection of Roswell and Johnson Ferry roads.
It’s now the site of a Valvoline oil change shop that recently opened, and the bench is located on the southbound Johnson Ferry side.
According to Richardson’s office, “this tribute recognizes his hard work, kindness, and the positive impact he’s made in our community. His customers shared how Lyn’s station was more than just a business; it was a cornerstone of the community.
“We also want to extend a special thank you to Valvoline for generously sponsoring the bench.”
The Chevron station that opened in the 1970s closed in late 2020, and was demolished in early 2021. Commissioners approved a site plan amendment in 2022 to permit the oil change business.
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Valerie Crow, the director of communications for Cobb and Douglas Public Health, has been named the 2024 recipient of the Georgia Public Health Association Communications Excellence Award.
Valerie Crow, Cobb and Douglas Public Health
The honor was awarded on May 3 at the association’s annual convention on Jekyll Island.
Crow has held that position for 10 years. She attended Sope Creek ES, Dickerson MS and Walton HS and still lives in East Cobb.
She is involved with the Chattahoochee Plantation Women’s Club and attends Johnson Ferry Baptist Church.
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“It’s totally appropriate for Sunny and the park,” Diane Spencer of Frameworks Gallery said of the creation of a garden at East Cobb Park in memory of her late sister, Sunny Walker.
As the 50th anniversary of her East Cobb business approached earlier this year, Diane Spencer couldn’t help but think of her late sister.
“Sunny” Walker wasn’t just a family member but a business partner at Frameworks Gallery at Woodlawn Square Shopping Center on Johnson Ferry Road.
Walker, who died in 2019, also was a leading figure in the creation of East Cobb’s first passive park.
As an inaugural board member and later president of the volunteer group Friends for the East Cobb Park, Walker was heavily involved in the efforts to identify, purchase and convert land on Roswell Road, along Sewell Mill Creek, into what’s become one of the most popular parks in Cobb County.
The 20 acres that make up the park once was farmland, then became the home to Bowles Oil Company.
The park features multi-use trails, playgrounds, grassy recreational space, pavilions and a concert shell. Events include regular musical concerts, holiday celebrations and a Veterans Day salute.
More than anything, Walker and those behind the park’s creation simply wanted a place in the community where people could gather, recreate and enjoy natural beauty.
“There was no central gathering place” in East Cobb, Spencer said. Her sister “envisioned this very much being a community gathering place.”
Those leading the Friends group now are working to enhance the vision of the 21-year-old park. Last year, the East Cobb Park Garden Club was formed, with the goal of beautifying the park.
Its first project was seeding natural plants and perennial flower beds.
Now, the club will be taking on a major improvement, in honor of Sunny Walker.
A portion of greenspace below the gazebo overlooking the back quad of the park will be carved out to create what Spencer calls “Sunny’s Butterfly Park.”
Kurt von Borries, the group’s current president, came up with the idea when Spencer approached him about doing something to honor her sister.
“It’s totally appropriate for Sunny and the park,” she said.
A rendering of “Sunny’s Butterfly Garden” at East Cobb Park.
It will be an all-season garden featuring more than two dozen types of flowers, covering several hundred square feet. The garden is being designed by Lyn Cohen, head of the East Cobb Park Garden Club, who’s a professional landscape architect.
To be planted include redbuds, Black-Eyed Susans, daffodils, hydrangeas and other varietals.
“It’s really a pollinator garden,” Spencer said, explaining the origins of the garden’s name. “But that doesn’t sound as good as butterfly garden.”
Cohen’s company, SiteOne Landscape Supply, is donating stone, mulch and some other materials. Two Japanese maple trees also will be donated, according to von Borries.
But between $10,000 to $15,000 needs to be raised to purchase and plant the flowers, and to build out and maintain the garden. The work is expected to get underway later this spring, with completion aimed for the fall.
To that effort, Spencer is holding a fundraising open house at Frameworks next week, donating between 30 to 100 percent of whatever she sells in the store for the garden.
The hours for the open house are from 4-8 p.m. Thursday, April 25, and during store hours Friday-Saturday April 26-27 from 10-6 (1205 Johnson Ferry Road, Suite 110).
Frameworks features painting, sculpture and ceramics made by local and Georgia artists. Spencer said some of them agreed to donate their works for the fundraiser.
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Since Friends for the East Cobb Park is a 501(c)3 non-profit, she’ll also have tax receipts for purchasers.
(Anyone can donate at anytime online, in an amount of their choosing, by clicking here. Checks should be made out to Friends for the East Cobb Park.)
Von Borries admitted that “it’s going to be a challenge” to maintain the garden, which will be the major project of the garden club.
Long-term, he’s hopeful that East Cobb Park could someday include a botanical garden.
“We’re just trying to beautify the park,” he said. “We’ve got a lot of land to work with.”
Walker was previously honored in 2017 with a piano named after her at the gazebo, but which has since been removed. There’s also a bridge named after her connecting the current park to its newer space extending toward Fullers Park.
Spencer said the garden is the perfect way to honor her memory.
“This is kind of a personal thing,” she said. “There are so many people who knew and loved Sunny.
“This is a prime example of what can be done with this park. Sunny would have envisioned that. I think that’s what she would want to see. I think this will be a milestone for the park.”
Sunny Walker “dreamed big,” according to the first president of the Friends for the East Cobb Park, “and we bought into it.”
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Wes Rhea’s life and career has taken him to many places—from professional wrestling to the corporate world and to academia.
The Sprayberry High School graduate recently published a book about those experiences and to help others with career transition entitled “Off the Top Rope,” and on Dec. 9 he’ll have a book signing.
That event will take place from 12-4 p.m. at the 2nd and Charles store (815 Ernest Barrett Parkway).
He tells us his book is “geared towards helping people with career development and career transition with faith and a positive approach as well as my journey from a professional wrestler to a corporate executive to a university professor. I thoroughly enjoy helping others and I feel my book would be an inspiration.”
Rhea is a part-time information systems instructor at Kennesaw State University, his college alma mater. After high school, he was a professional wrestler from the late 1980s to the early 1990s (on his website, there’s a photo of him with Muhammad Ali stemming from those days).
He earned an MBA and law degree and became an executive in the telecommunications, financial and health care industries.
Rhea also was a senior lecturer at KSU teaching in the undergraduate and executive MBA programs and has served as a career coach.
In a recent profile in the Cobb in Focus magazine, Rhea said that “I’m not sure too many people go from being a professional wrestler to a C-level executive to a college professor. Probably not the most straightforward path; however, that seems to be the way I do things. Hey, it may not be the track for everyone but it allowed me to live a semi-charmed life.”
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Angela Williams describes how her life has changed since she was the victim of childhood abuse as “a 40-year journey I’ve been on.”
She’s shared her story as an advocate for those who’ve gone through similar ordeals, helping them to learn how to reach out for support.
The East Cobb resident is the author of several books on the subject, including an initial memoir, “From Sapphires to Sorrows,” which explained how she began climbing out of her situation.
But Williams admits she’s long been haunted by the challenges of living with what happened to her, even as she continues to guide fellow victims to develop resiliency for a lifetime.
Last week, she published another memoir, “Loving Me: After Abuse,” which she says is a deeper, even more personal telling of the path out of abuse, with the aim of it being “a self-help guide.”
She held a book launch last week at the DK Art Gallery in Marietta and on Sept. 30 will be leading a “Time to Heal” Conference in Woodstock.
For 14 years, starting at the age of three, Williams was the victim of physical, emotional and sexual abuse. She said 93 percent of abusers are people their victims “know and trust.”
Williams said coming to terms with the emotional as well as physical pain of being abused hasn’t been easy to confront, but after a conversation with a friend she decided she needed to do just that in her latest book.
In order to truly help others even more, Williams realized she had to make herself even more vulnerable in sharing her story.
“It’s about wanting to live a life where you’re not tormented,” Williams said in a recent interview with East Cobb News. “It’s about walking in a life where you’re living to your fullest potential.”
Even as she went all-in on helping fellow survivors, including getting a degree in forensic psychology, Williams said “it took many years” for her to feel that she was truly moving in that direction.
In the book, Williams details “the amount of shame and feeling so unlovable” that led to a suicide attempt at the age of 17.
It left her homeless, and she persevered with her work ethic, and as a young adult got married and had children (who attended Pope High School and the University of Georgia).
“I worked on burying it,” Williams said of her memories of being abused. “It felt like holding a beach ball under water 24/7. I tried to mask it, but I wasn’t healthy.
“I wasn’t the wife and mother I wanted to be.”
She said she underwent “intense counseling” after thinking about suicide again—Williams said she never attempted to carry it out—and in her 30s, began to feel the clouds lifting.
“I learned to give myself grace,” Williams said. “I really built my faith in God.”
Her advocacy led to the creation of Angela’s Voice, which provides resources for the awareness, prevention and healing of child sexual abuse.
They include workbooks to teach children to defend themselves against abusive behavior, and she conducts support groups for survivors.
Williams has taken her message to schools, non-profits, faith communities and medical offices, and is developing more curricula.
“It’s about helping survivors to heal,” Williams said, adding that only one in 10 people who are abused will ever tell anyone about it.
“I hope that my book will give them the hope that they need,” Williams said.
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A couple weeks ago we brought you the story of Charlie Porter, an East Cobb resident who was preparing for a kidney transplant, along with his son Teddy, who was his donor.
That procedure took place last Tuesday in Nashville, and this morning we got the following information and photo above from Charlie:
“I have been in a bit of a bubble since surgery but now that my head is clearing, I wanted to let you know that the transplant was a huge success. Teddy did great and he is now back home being taken care of by his mother and girlfriend. I’ll remain in Nashville for another six weeks or so.
“The surgical staff, nurses etc are all very happy with how everything went.”
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From the time he was a young boy, Teddy Porter was raised by his father in a modest home in East Cobb where he participated in a variety of youth sports.
He played recreational basketball at Johnson Ferry Baptist Church and baseball at Sandy Plains Baseball, and football in the Pope High School programs. His father was his youth coach for a couple of years.
With his years as a Pope student disrupted by COVID-19 closures and restrictions, Teddy wasn’t sure what he wanted to do after graduating in 2021.
A few months later, Charlie Porter, his father, was told he would need a kidney transplant.
Without hesitation, Teddy volunteered to donate a kidney.
“I thought that I probably had the best chance” to be a good match, he said.
But Charlie was hesitant, even though Teddy did turn out to be an ideal donor.
“I don’t know how much time I have left,” says Charlie, 69, from the living room of his home off North Hembree Road, in an interview this week with East Cobb News.
“But at first I said I don’t want to put my 21-year-old-son under the knife.”
A friend, Brenda Isaac of the One Love Learning Foundation, an Atlanta non-profit that helps children in disadvantaged situations through the establishment of schools and community gardens, reminded him that he wanted to raise his son in a stable community, and that he made sacrifices to do so.
“Here’s his chance to give back,” Charlie recollected Isaac telling him about Teddy’s offer to donate a kidney.
On Tuesday, Charlie, Teddy and Isaac will be in Nashville, where the transplant will take place at Vanderbilt Health.
After the surgery, Teddy will return home after a few days, while Charlie will have to stay for at least a month, and possibly up to eight weeks.
In the months since they made this father-son arrangement, Charlie said he’s been able to reflect upon the role of his children—he has two daughters, 40 and 38, who are Teddy’s half-sisters—who have rushed to their father’s side during his health crisis.
“It’s been a lesson in love for me,” said Charlie, who had to retire last year after a 30-year career in the trade show business. “They’ve shown up unconditionally for me.”
Teddy’s parents are divorced. He was home-schooled for a while until his father got sole custody. His mom is still close by—she’ll be looking after Teddy after he returns from the transplant operation—and he said he doesn’t see much of a downside to being a donor.
“My mom has been very helpful,” Teddy said.
He’ll lose a kidney, but said doctors told him the capacity of his remaining kidney “expands by 20-30 percent.”
There aren’t many side effects, although he can’t take ibuprofen. And he won’t be able to go back to heavy lifting at various trade show jobs he’s had right away.
As a male, he can’t pass on the gene for Alport Syndrome, a rare condition Charlie inherited from his mother.
And if Teddy should need a kidney transplant at some point in his life, he would be a priority since he’s been a donor.
“Most people with this don’t make it to my age,” Charlie says of Alport Syndrome, which affects mostly children and young adults.
He’s had a uralysis every five years, and it’s the one he had in 2021 that resulted in the Alport Syndrome diagnosis.
After about a year, Charlie wanted a second opinion, after enduring quite a bit of fatigue. In addition to his work, he couldn’t even mill around in his garden or volunteer at the One Love Learning gardens, including one at Maynard Jackson High School in Atlanta.
Neither has he been able to continue taking up yoga, which he says has been a revelation to him. After his mother died, he started taking classes at Peach Out Power Yoga in East Cobb, and befriended owner Karen Patton.
“I fell in love with it,” Charlie says. “It changed my life in many ways.”
He credits yoga in part for contributing to his his otherwise good health, which made him a strong candidate for a transplant.
So he’s hopeful about his prospects after the transplant.
“If all goes well, I should be able to get another eight to 10 years,” Charlie said.
“I thought it was 20,” Teddy responded.
On Tuesday, Teddy’s surgery will begin early in the morning, and last around two hours. Charlie’s surgery will take place immediately after that, and he is expected to remain in the hospital for a few days before staying in an Airbnb he has rented out in Nashville.
While he rehabs, there will be follow-up visits with doctors before he’s allowed to return home.
Charlie’s already turning the wheels in his own mind about becoming active in his life again. He served on the board of the East Cobb YMCA, in addition to his career and other community activities.
“I have been active since I was 16 years old,” he said. “That’s been the hardest thing for me. Now I’m starting to look at the other side of this.”
He wants to get back to yoga and gardening, and to see his son further into adulthood. Teddy said he’s pondering college but possibly joining the military more than that.
“This process has been a family affair,” Charlie said. “My three children have rallied around me, and it’s amazing to me that they said they were going to do this together.”
Charlie looked Teddy squarely in the eyes and said “my son gave me a purpose. A big part of my life was raising this boy, and I just wanted him to be a good boy.
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Risa Rambo wants to compete in the Transplant Games in Birmingham, Ala., next summer because “this one is so close and I hope my boys and sister can go.” ECN photo.
After undergoing a heart transplant in her mid-40s, Risa Rambo found refuge—as well as a rigorous physical rehab regimen—in competitive sports activities.
She earned medals in two different runnings of The Transplant Games of America, including being the most Valuable Participant for the Team Georgia in 2012.
Some of the medals Rambo has earned at The Transplant Games of America.
A year later, the former high school and college basketball player was at her home on St. Simons Island when she suffered a hemorrhagic stroke, a life-threatening rupture of a blood vessel in the brain.
“My son found me, I was unconscious,” Rambo, 63, says in an interview with East Cobb News in the lobby of the Sterling Estates assisted living community on Lower Roswell Road, where she has lived for the last eight years.
After being rushed to a hospital in nearby Brunswick, Ga., she had emergency brain surgery. Rambo was unconscious for several weeks, and later had to undergo a more grueling rehab in Atlanta at the Shepherd Center, which helps patients recover from spinal cord and brain injuries.
She would be lifted out of bed by rehab specialists, and “they would work you real hard,” from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. almost daily.
“They had to teach me how to walk again,” Rambo said. “I was real scared.”
Part of the therapy was putting a basketball in her hand when she walked, to keep her head up.
Rambo, who as Risa Turton was a hoops star at Crisp Academy and Crisp County High School in Cordele, Ga., and played at the University of Mississippi and Mercer University, knew she would never be able to live the same way again.
After college, she married and raised three sons, and after her divorce, stayed active playing golf on St. Simons. She returned there after leaving Shepherd.
But she could no longer do basic things for herself, such as cook or even change bed linens.
Rambo as a basketball player at Ole Miss.
“I just needed help,” she said. “I couldn’t live by myself.”
Paige Sander, her sister and legal guardian, lives in East Cobb, and in 2015 Rambo came to live at Sterling Estates to be closer to her. There, the staff cooks her meals, does her laundry and cleans her room once a week.
She walks with something of a limp, but is alert and responsive in a busy facility where she greets everyone, including a 106-year-old resident.
Rambo takes walks around the Sterling Estates pedestrian loop and enjoys the facility’s small pool.
But she says she wants to try cooking again soon, and desires some more independence.
Most of all, Rambo wants to get back to the Transplant Games, which became a major source of support and social life with her fellow transplant recipients.
The next Transplant Games take place in the summer of 2024 in Birmingham, Ala., and Rambo is excited about an in-person return. A virtual competition took place during the pandemic, and she was mailed some medals.
But she misses the camaraderie and wants her family to take part in the experience, which like the Olympics also includes opening and closing ceremonies.
Rambo had a long recovery from a stroke in 2013.
“This one is so close,” Rambo said. “I hope my boys and my sister can go. The closer it gets, the harder I train.”
She wants to compete in swimming, cycling and basketball. She and her sister attend Johnson Ferry Baptist Church, where Rambo shoots basketball two or three times a week.
“I’m still trying to get it up to the goal,” she said. “I’ve got a year to work on it.”
Rambo says she can drive, but prefers not to, and gets where she needs to go with her sister and via the Sterling Estates vans that circulate around East Cobb.
She has checkups twice a year at Emory University for her heart, and said that she “checked out well” after a recent EKG.
While she knows the activities are helpful for her brain and body, it’s the connection to others that she values just as much.
After having to retire due to her medical situation, Rambo said “I didn’t do anything for a while, and I got depressed. I wasn’t sleeping.”
At Sterling Estates, she pulls out the facility’s daily activities calendar, which is crammed with outings, bingo, movies and physical therapy and exercise sessions.
Rambo’s stroke rehab included walking with a basketball to help keep her head up.
She also enjoys spending time with friends she has made on the Team Georgia of the Transplant Games. They’ve gone to Braves games and are having a fish fry in August.
Rambo speaks matter-of-factly about the myriad of health issues she’s endured—”I’ve come a long way”—and even the death of one of her sons last year to suicide at the age of 30.
A good support system, Rambo said, has been vital for her recovery.
“You trust in God, and my friends and my family,” she said.
Water workouts are part of Rambo’s continuing recovery from a stroke.Family visits and social activities with fellow transplant recipients have been a big part of Rambo’s support system.
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(Editor’s Note: Bill Hendrick and I worked at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution but did not know each other during the years we were there together—Wendy Parker)
An idea that was more 25 years in the making came to fruition this fall for East Cobb resident Bill Hendrick when he became a first-time book author.
A longtime journalist for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Hendrick reported in 1994 about some artifacts that were discovered at a construction site in downtown Atlanta, including an unexploded shell fired by Union General William Sherman’s troops during the battle of Atlanta.
Hendrick’s curiosity also was piqued by something else: The discovery of Atlanta’s leading newspaper during the Civil War years.
A visit to that construction area with legendary Atlanta historian Franklin Garrett introduced Hendrick to the story of the Atlanta Daily Intelligencer.
Hendrick and his wife Laura raised two sons in East Cobb, and they graduated from Walton High School and the University of Georgia. Jordan is an attorney in Decatur and Stuart is a writer and teacher in Atlanta.
While Hendrick researched the newspaper issues, Davis, a former East Cobb resident and author of other Civil War-related books, supplied the larger historical backdrop.
They began their collaboration in 2017, and met nearly daily to discuss their work, often at Goldbergs Bagel on Johnson Ferry Road (where this interview was conducted).
The result is nearly 500 pages of text with extensive footnotes and bibliographical information.
“I wasn’t thinking about making any money when we started,” said Hendrick, who left the AJC in 2008 and also was a reporter for the Associated Press in Atlanta.
“I just thought it would be interesting to see how a newspaper covered a war.”
What’s left of the Atlanta Daily Intelligencer offices after the Battle of Atlanta.
By contemporary standards, the look, feel and reportage of the paper is dramatically different. The Daily Intelligencer published four broadsheet pages each day of pure text. There were no photos but plenty of front page ads and obituaries, and many of the bylines were pseudonyms.
A typical front page during the war (see below) included battle reports, dispatches first published in other newspapers and ads for land, “desired goods” and slaves.
Atlanta’s population during the Civil War was around 10,000 (a fifth of them enslaved), and the newspaper’s circulation was around 3,000, Hendrick said.
The publisher of the paper, Jared Whitaker, was prominent citizen and city council member when the war broke out, and a devout supporter of the Confederate cause.
Those views were frequently reflected in the newspages, which Hendrick said bluntly was a pro-Confederacy, anti-Lincoln propaganda organ (here’s an excerpt).
The Daily Intelligencer struggled to purchase newsprint after its supplier, the Marietta Paper Mill, was burned by Union troops as they approached Sope Creek in July 1864. The mill was targeted because it also printed Confederate currency.
Much of the war-related content in the Daily Intelligencer came from other newspapers that received battlefield reports from correspondents.
The newspaper exchange program that was a forerunner of the modern newspaper content syndicates included the Atlanta paper sending copies even to their Northern counterparts for a time.
But in the Daily Intelligencer, Hendrick noted, “there was hardly any coverage of the the Battle of Atlanta.”
That was due in part to the newspaper evacuating its operations to Macon as Sherman’s troops laid siege to Atlanta.
After the Daily Intelligencer staff returned to town, the building where its office was located—above a liquor wholesaler on Whitehall Street in what’s now Underground Atlanta—had been destroyed by the Union bombardments.
A correspondent filed a dispatch of that incident, writing of a shell fragment that “should I go to Macon soon, I will have it with me, as a moment of the love that is borne for us by our Northern brethren.”
John Steele, the newspaper’s editor, thundered from Macon about Sherman and his troops that “their success in battering to pieces the impenetrable fortress Atlanta, must have given them great satisfaction. The murder of women and children, by fragments of their barbarous shells, will be a gory blot on the savage and unsoldierlike campaign of Sherman the flanker.”
The front page of an 1863 edition of the Atlanta Daily Intelligencer. For a larger version click here. Digital Library of Georgia
“The news was always late,” Hendrick said of the Daily Intelligencer, including news of the assassination of Abraham Lincoln shortly after the war ended.
During the Battle of Gettysburg, he said, the paper “didn’t admit for days that the South had lost. Initially, they said it was a great victory. But you can only deny it for so long.”
What also foiled the Daily Intelligencer’s narrative were the letters written home by soldiers, as well as messages sent via telegram, from troops and others who witnessed the combat first-hand.
The book includes a telegram the newspaper printed from a Southern soldier writing home to his father that he lost an arm in Gettysburg. That soldier, Lt. William Nesbit, recovered from his wounds and lived to be an old man in Alpharetta and Cherokee County.
When civilians on the home front started getting a different story from what was in the press, Hendrick said, “they started asking questions.”
As to why correspondents didn’t want to use their own names, Hendrick said “I think they didn’t want to take crap from the people they interviewed.
“I’m sure the generals knew who they were talking to but they never saw their names in the paper.”
Hendrick maintains ownership rights to the trade name Atlanta Daily Intelligencer, which was the only newspaper in Atlanta to survive the war.
But it didn’t last long, ceasing publication in 1871, as Reconstruction continued and as Atlanta was becoming, in the words a decade later of Henry Grady, the publisher of The Atlanta Constitution, “the capital of The New South.”
Hendrick updates his registration for the Daily Intelligencer every year with the Georgia Secretary of State’s office.
“I own a newspaper that doesn’t exist,” Hendrick cracked.
The research for the book was grueling—he spent nearly six months combing through the microfilm copies of the Daily Intelligencer at the Atlanta History Center.
“I almost went blind,” he said with deadpan humor. “But it was fun. I was fascinated with how newspapers operated.”
At the age of 75, Hendrick is taking on a new book subject that he’s doing by himself, a history of American newspapers in the 19th century.
“If I live to finish it,” he joked.
Hendrick says the research is a lot easier due to the wealth of information available online. He said he was ecstatic, for example, to find a story about the Alamo on newspapers.com.
“If it takes another four years,” Hendrick said of his current project, “I may be dead.”
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Steven Blesi sent out a photo of his son on social media after a Saturday stampede in South Korea. Steven Blesi Jr. was among 154 people killed in the incident in Seoul.
Among the more than 150 victims of a Halloween incident in Seoul, South Korea that turned into a deadly stampede was a college student from Northeast Cobb.
Kennesaw State University announced on Sunday that Steve Blesi, 20, a sophomore majoring in international business, was among those killed on Saturday.
The Lassiter High School graduate was studying in a semester abroad program in South Korea. KSU said it has 11 students in that program this semester and the other students are safe.
“On behalf of the entire Kennesaw State community, our thoughts and prayers go out to Steven’s family and friends as they mourn this incomprehensible loss,” Kennesaw State University President Kathy Schwaig said in the social media message.
Earlier Sunday, Blesi’s father Steven Blesi sent out a desperate message on Twitter saying he’d heard about the stampede but had not been able to get in contact with his son.
Later he Tweeted that “We just got confirmation our son died” and asked for time to grieve. Later on Monday, he interacted with the media and public on social media.
“He was a great young man with a big heart. Never said anything bad about anyone, was so full of love and loved by many.”
He responded to another user on Twitter saying that “We have to be strong for our other son who I will pick up at college today. Somehow we have to press on, but our lives have forever changed.”
“I just never thought something like this would happen,” he said. “I can’t understand how they didn’t have crowd control. I don’t even know how the hell it happened.”
He described his son as having “an adventurous spirit” and who “could have done anything he wanted in this world.”
According to a social media post by the Lassiter PTSA, the younger Steve Blesi graduated in 2020 and his brother Joseph graduated in 2019.
State Rep. John Carson of Northeast Cobb sent out a statement of condolence Monday afternoon to Steve Blesi Jr. and his wife Maria, saying the younger Blesi “was a devoted member of the Eagle Scout, Northeast Cobb County and Kennesaw State University communities, and in his short time on this earth, he was truly a bright light to all of those around him. He will be dearly missed, always remembered and forever loved.”
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Dr. Melissa Wikoff, the founder and director of audiology at Peachtree Hearing in East Cobb, has been named a Next Generation Award winner by Cobb Young Professionals.
CYP is the Cobb Chamber of Commerce’s networking and development arm for professionals in their 20s and 30s. Wikoff leads her own practice in addressing issues regarding hearing loss at 4939 Lower Roswell Road and is involved in the field nationally.
According to the Cobb Chamber, “CYP award winners and nominees are all in their 20s or 30s, active within their community, demonstrate leadership ability in the community and in their current role, and offer a unique perspective.”
Wikoff—pictured with fellow NGA recipient Jon Ingram, Director of Corporate Relations at the Woodruff Arts Center—opened Peachtree Hearing in 2016.
She is on the board of directors on the national level for the American Tinnitus Association (ATA) and at the local level for Aloha to Aging, an East Cobb-based non-profit that helps seniors and their caregivers.
Wikoff mentors students at the Washington University School of Medicine, where she earned her Doctor of Audiology degree, and founded a program called Hearing Aids for Holocaust Survivors.
She donates hearing aids and services to survivors in the metro Atlanta area and was recently honored with the Jewish Federation of Greater Atlanta’s Jewish Abilities Alliance’s Very-Inclusive-Person award for her work with local hard-of-hearing community.
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Back in April 2020, the earliest graduating classes from Wheeler High School were supposed to have a collective reunion picnic.
That would have been the 50th anniversary of Wheeler’s first senior class in 1967, and invitations were expanded to go through the Class of 1972.
The COVID-19 pandemic put a halt to that gathering, and reunion organizer Nancy Collier got back in touch this week to say that the event has finally been rescheduled.
It’s now taking place on Saturday, Oct. 8, at the same location of the originally scheduled event (Riverside Day Use Area of Lake Allatoona on Lake Allatoona Dam Road) and the same cost ($25 person, $40 couple).
“It’s on, come hell or high water,” as noted in the attached flyer, which also helpfully points out takes place on the same day as the UGA-Auburn football game.
Two years ago they wanted to have it in the spring to avoid such a conflict, but it’s been a long wait.
The festivities began at 11 a.m. and include food catered by Williamson Bros. BBQ, live music and more.
Check the flyer for more details or visit http://wheeler69.com/. There are instructions in both places on how to pay in advance. If you show up unannounced, “you will go to the back of the food line.”
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For 14 years, starting at the age of three, Williams was the victim of physical, emotional and sexual abuse. She said 93 percent of abusers are people their victims “know and trust.”
