Aurora Lodge No. 54, Free and Accepted Masons, Prince
Hall Affiliate, and New Aurora Chapter No. 60, Order of the Eastern Star, are located across the street from Thankful Missionary Baptist
Church. Aurora Lodge No. 54 was started in 1883. The two-story, brick building was constructed in the 1950s. The organizations meet on the second floor. At one point, a store was open on the first floor.
The Thankful Missionary Baptist Church in Waynesboro, Georgia, was founded in 1878. It was part of the Walker Baptist Association, which comprised of Black churches in and around the greater Augusta, Georgia area.
The two-tower church differs from many of the two-tower churches seen around the rural South. Most include a gable in the middle. This one utilizes a flat roofline. The church was built in 1923 in the Romanesque Revival style. Romanesque Revival, in its most modest form, like this church, includes brick, towers, and arched entranceways.
A Japanese pagoda–style ranch built in 1962 by contractor Fred Lee Hylick is located in the historic Collier Heights, one of the first upscale communities in the nation built exclusively by Black planners, architects, and construction companies. Hylick advertised himself as “The House Surgeon for Home Modernization.”
Thanks to Archive Atlanta for introducing me to this great house.
Harmony Grove Cemetery is just located off W. Paces Ferry Road in Atlanta’s Buckhead. Dating back to 1870, the cemetery’s earliest burial was the infant son of James H. “Whispering” Smith, a prominent landowner whose estate was near today’s Governor’s Mansion. The last known burial was in 1982.
Buckhead Heritage’s rehabilitation of Harmony Grove Cemetery earned the 2009 Preservation Award for Excellence in Rehabilitation from the Georgia Trust for Historic Preservation.
August Krause was a German immigrant known for his stone carving work. It is assumed he did the first two markers on this page for his wife and his son. His daughter Charlotte was the last known burial.
