It's Finally Here!

Fortune & Folly:
The Weird and Wonderful Life of the South’s Most Eccentric Millionaire

During the summer of 2022, I entered the contracting process with UGA Press to publish my manuscript. Nearly a year and a half later, it’s finally real, in print, in stores, and in my very own hands. I couldn’t be prouder of the final result, and I hope people enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. With nearly 300 citations and reviewed by well respected Georgia historians, I can honestly say I did my absolute best to represent Asa Candler Jr.’s history as accurately as possible. If you’d like to learn so much more than is available on this site, plus exclusive photos of the Briarcliff Zoological Park and Briarcliff Laundry, this book is for you.

Order it online at Amazon.com, Bookshop.org, and more.

Presentation: From Racetrack to Runway

In March of this year I presented a deck titled “From Racetrack to Runway: How the Coca-Cola Candlers gave Atlanta its Airport” at the Georgia State Archives. Part of their Lunch and Learn series, the session was recorded and published to their YouTube channel. If you’d like to watch it, you can find it here:

Link

Update: Landrum Anderson

I’ve added an updated version of a blog post I wrote two years ago with some updated information about Landrum Anderson. Landrum was Asa Candler, Jr.’s employee from 1901 until his death in 1953. Always loyal and favored by his employer, Landrum’s history has unfortunately become lost and skewed by anecdotal family lore that misrepresents and obfuscates who he was as a person. I’ve tried to unravel the mystery of who Landrum Anderson really was, and I’ve formed some pretty strong opinions about what obligation historic researchers have to question anecdotes that perpetuate racist stereotypes. I haven’t solved the Landrum Anderson puzzle, but I believe I’ve learned enough to restore some of his humanity. Read more here.

Update The Ice Storm of 1905

New update! I’ve added a short story about the ice storm that swept through the Southeastern United States in 1905. This February marks the 115 anniversary of the storm, which tore down telegraph wires and power lines, and caused a full-stop in rail traffic across the state.

This story explains why any genealogy research will identify Asa Sr., Asa Jr., Asa IV, and Asa V. If you’ve ever wondered if there was an Asa III, this short update will answer that question. Enjoy!

Update: Murder at the Mansion

For everyone who always believed Briarcliff Mansion is haunted, I have encouraging news for you. There was, in fact, a murder that took place on the property. I ran across this story within the first couple of months of research but it took nearly a year and a half to find all of the resources I needed to piece the story together and figure out what really took place.

There’s a lot of misinformation out there if you only refer to a few newspaper archives. I went to quite a number of sources, including a request for the original police report record from the Atlanta Police Department. They got back to me in a reasonable amount of time, but informed me that the record was “purged.” I spoke with the Dekalb County Medical Examiner’s office, but their records didn’t go far back enough. I spoke with H. M. Patterson and Sons Funeral Home to see if their records went that far back. They did, or at least they used to. But several years ago their basement flooded and destroyed records from the 1930s and earlier.

It was a long journey that stopped off through several conspiracy theories before I had clarity. At one point I had to research right-hand drive versus left-hand drive cars in 1931 because it mattered, depending on whether we could assume the murderer was right-handed. But perseverance paid off because I feel confident that the version of the story I’ve compiled is the closest representation of truth that we’ll ever have.

In the end, I knew I had to find the murderer’s grave to get closure. I had some luck with Westview Cemetery, although not at first. Not being family of the deceased, they couldn’t tell me where his grave was located. But I stuck with it and eventually received a plot number and a map that took me to the site. The feelings I experienced as I stood at the end of the unmarked depression in the ground were very complicated. I guess that happens when you get invested in a project about dead people from 90 years ago.

I hope you enjoy the story as much as I did as I untangled it. If you have any questions or theories, feel free to contact me.

Update: The Great Mule Mart Drama

It’s high time I start sharing some of the entertaining events in Asa Candler, Jr.’s life. I have a list to cover, but up until now I’ve been stymied with indecision over where to start. I was stuck thinking I had to go chronologically, but really wanted to start with my favorites.

Today I got over it and decided to just start wherever I was inspired. And what inspired me today was an event I call The Great Mule Mart Drama of the 1920s. It can be read on its own, but reading the saga of the Atlanta Speedway will provide some insights and show how history repeated itself throughout Asa Jr.’s cycles.

Buddie Stories are inherently more subjective than the timeline section of the site. After so much research and so many data points, I’ve naturally drawn conclusions based on what I know. So prepare for editorializing, and feel free to contact me if you disagree with any of my conclusions or if you feel I’ve misrepresented Atlanta’s history.

I hope you enjoy reading my Buddie Stories as much as I love telling them.

Final Installment of the Atlanta Speedway Saga

Candler Field, Late 1920s

And I’m spent. What started out as a five-part series about the history of the Atlanta Speedway became a six-parter, and part six is finally live.

Candler Field Becomes Hartsfield Airport connects the timeline of the closure of the Speedway to the migration of Emory College to Druid Hills, and explains how Atlanta became home to the busiest airport in the world.

Now that I’ve finished this mini-series, I’m going to start working on individual episodes in Asa Candler, Jr.’s life and adding them to the site bit by bit. Stay tuned, the most entertaining tales are still to come. Please don’t hesitate to contact me if you have any stories, ideas, or questions about the Candlers.

Speedway Saga, Pt 5: The Garage Fire of 1911

New update, and this story is a juicy one. I’ll admit, I have many strong opinions about the garage fire of 1911, and those opinions are laid out plainly for all to read and consider. Expect some subjectivity.

I’ve spent nearly 3 years researching all available facts about Asa Candler, Jr., and I’ve made every effort to remain objective. Because he was a man of big personality and big actions, he attracted criticism like he wore a target on his head. So I was open to the possibility that some of his negative press may have been influenced by outside factors.

I went into this project knowing the tone of the enduring myths and wanting the facts to prove out whether the tone was justified. I didn’t want to adopt the wry, overly-forgiving bias of family historians, and I didn’t want to adopt the drama-seeking, schadenfreude of Emory student lore and community gossip. When I reached out to one of Buddie’s great-grandsons, he expressed concern that I was looking for controversy, as so many others had. My promise to him was that I would not invent drama where none existed. And I’ve stayed true to that. I continue to make efforts to dismantle untrue stories and replace them with the less exciting ones, even if it disappoints people who enjoy the legends.

But some of Buddie’s stories are legitimately exciting. The garage fire of 1911, for example, is legitimately exciting. And the facts surrounding the incident bring me to conclusions that have the potential to create more controversy than any of the existing legends.

So I’ve grappled with my conclusions, reviewed the research and continued to seek out new primary sources to corroborate the facts. Ultimately I have to stand by my conclusions because when all of the information is laid out on the table, I’m drawn to those conclusions again and again.

So please enjoy reading The Garage Fire of 1911. Whatever opinion you’ve formed about Asa Candler, Jr., up to this point may take a turn. And every moment past this point may be colored by this incident. Especially since there are much bigger incidents yet to come.

Update: The Fall of the Atlanta Speedway

John Candler behind the wheel of his daddy’s prized Lozier, November 1910.

It’s finally up, after much turmoil and consternation. Part of the process of posting these updates is re-validating my research and revisiting all of my primary sources to check dates and details. In doing so for this post I found one significant event that I had noted in 1909 at the start of the fall, when in actuality it happened in 1910 at the end.

That shift impacted my understanding of the timeline of events and required some deeper digging to further validate or debunk any previous assumptions in the timeline. Time well spent, and I’m certainly glad I found the error. But it was time spent that I didn’t anticipate. Ultimately it didn’t change the overall narrative, but it did color motivations differently, and that’s important.

And then around 10pm my computer spontaneously shut down, trashing 2 hours of work. So this update is far from perfect, but it’s live and I’ll revisit it later to clean up any grammar or spelling mistakes that may have slipped through.

You can find The Fall of the Atlanta Speedway in the navigation in the Atlanta Speedway section, or by clicking here.

The next update will be a fun one, so stay tuned.

Bonus Time: Podcast Style

Back in May I did a guest appearance on an Atlanta-based podcast called Trashy Divorces. It’s a delightfully decadent show that digs into the juicy details of celebrity splits, and I highly recommend it if you appreciate old Hollywood gossip.

I was invited to share a Candler family story for a special Patreon-only bonus feature. I decided to tell a tale that won’t feature in my book and probably won’t appear on this site because it’s not about Asa Jr. It’s about Asa Sr. If you have an hour and an interest in the media circus that surrounded the Candlers in the early 1920s, I invite you to listen to the story of New Orleans socialite Onezima DeBouchel and her brief but tumultuous engagement to Asa Griggs Candler, founder of Coca Cola.

Ms. Onezima DeBouchel and Asa Griggs Candler, Sr., St. Louis Post Dispatch Oct 22, 1922

Onezima DeBouchel claimed that Asa Sr. had fallen in love with her and intended to marry her until his family intervened and forced him to break it off. In one colorful interview she described an encounter with Asa Jr., which is how I stumbled across this delightful story. From my research notes:

ODB said she tried to avoid Atlanta and get together with him outside of town but couldn’t. So with her “nerves at a breaking point” she went into Atlanta and convinced him to meet her, but he brought his son.  Quotes:

• “I am alone and a defenseless woman in a town that you are supposed to own.  But if you think you need a bodyguard, assuredly bring one along.”

• “…A few minutes later, Asa G. Candler, old broken and timorous, entered the hotel.  With him was Asa G. Jr., dark and glowering.”

• “His son, his personal bodyguard, was immediately recognized as a purse-proud, red-faced, self-important little man.  He revealed commonality in every feature and in every word.”

• He would slip and say “darling” before correcting to "Mrs. De Bouchel," “…and then look in a frightened, sheepish sort of way at his son, who would glare at him and then glare at me and then glare at the ceiling and the floor and anything else he could glare at.”

• She claims he said, “Oh my darling, he cried, heartbrokenly. I’d marry you this minute if I could. But I can’t.  I’m up against a stonewall. This is breaking my heart. You are as dead as though you were in your coffin, and I wish I, too, were dead.” She adds about Asa Jr. that upon hearing this, “I thought his puffy little son would explode.”

If you don’t mind a bit of rambling, circuitous storytelling, give it a listen!

Bonus Divorce: Coca-Cola TrashCandy, 1920s Atlanta style....

The Atlanta Speedway Pt 3: Trouble at the Track

Edward Durant (L) and Asa Candler, Jr. (R)

I’ve published the next chapter in my series about the Atlanta Speedway. This entry covers the dramatic events that immediately followed the Fall 1909 inaugural races. Like the Legend of the Merry Widow, this is another one of my favorite stories that I discovered in my research. My favorite episodes are usually the ones that required significant cross-referencing and compiling from a multitude of sources in order to isolate the true version of events, and this one fulfilled that criteria.

The trouble that followed the 1909 races precipitated the downfall of the Atlanta Speedway, but much of the information about what happened was widely dispersed across auto racing publications, gossip rags, and archives of the defunct Atlanta Georgian newspaper. The Digital Library of Georgia ‘s historic newspaper database proved to be the most valuable source. And given how easily records of this publication could have been lost, I’m immensely grateful to the University System of Georgia for ensuring its preservation.

I hope you enjoy the he-said, he-said drama of two grown men squabbling over auto racing as much as I do.

FOUND! One of Asa Jr.'s Magic Tricks Located

I didn’t build this site and write a book about the life of Asa Candler Jr. with the belief that I know everything about his life. Quite the opposite. While at this point I can say with confidence that I know more about his life than anyone else, including previous biographers, I’m intensely aware of the remaining gaps in his history.

Asa Jr.’s magic years is a period that I’m particularly interested in, one where I’ve most wanted to find documentation and photographic evidence but come up empty handed everywhere I look. I’ve spoken with the two most prolific magic collectors in the country, one of whom is the archivist for one of the most famous celebrity magicians working today. Although both men knew about Asa Candler, Jr. and his infamous collection, neither had documentation or photographs.

Fortunately a magician by the name of Baffling Bill contacted me through this site and sent me information about an apparatus that he owns: a Thayer-made trick called the Phantom Cargo Cage, that’s confirmed to have originally belonged to Buddie. This is a trick that resided at Briarcliff Mansion in the third floor ballroom and would have been used during one of his magic soirées between 1928 and 1931.

Visit the Magic page to read about Asa Jr.’s magic years, view photographs of this trick and another one Bill helped to identify from Buddie’s original collection, and see a video of the Phantom Cargo Cage illusion being performed in front of a live audience. It’s pretty awesome.

If you know anything about Asa Jr.’s life, no matter how small the detail, please let me know me through the contact form on this site.

The Atlanta Speedway Part 2: The Legend of the Merry Widow

What turned out to be my favorite story about Asa Candler, Jr., is now live. It formerly lived in my author blog, but its rightful home is here, alongside the rest of Buddie’s adventures.

Originally posted back in July of 2017, the author blog version ended on a cliffhanger, promising insights into the drama caused by Barney Oldfield that landed Buddie and his friend Ed Durant in gossip columns throughout Atlanta. The follow-up post never happened because by that point I was deep into the first draft of Asa From the Ashes, my forthcoming novel based on the life of Asa Candler, Jr.

Now that this site is live and the manuscript is finalized, I will have to make time for the next part in the Atlanta Speedway’s journey very soon. Hold me to that.

The Atlanta Speedway Part 1: The Birth of the Atlanta Speedway

The first of what will be a 6-part series about the Atlanta Speedway is now live. You can find it in the top nav underneath a dedicated heading. Part 1 covers the cultural factors that fed the national appetite for automobile racing, Buddie Candler’s personal stake in the sport, and the business arrangements that funded the track’s creation. I’ve included original track blueprints and some inside info about how Buddie’s father, Coca Cola magnate Asa Candler, Sr., was financially involved in the endeavor. Stay tuned, because the financial arrangements get tricky in the track’s second year.

Scroll to the bottom for lots of photos from the 1909 inaugural races, as well as an article about the track’s inception written by Buddie himself. Coming soon I’ll tell the story of the Pope-Toledo race car known as The Merry Widow. If you can’t wait and you don’t mind rehashing the history lesson, you can find it on my author blog at shbutlerwrites.wordpress.com.

Oh, and if you recognize any of the unidentified racers in the photo set, please let me know by commenting here or using the form on the contact page. I’d love to get these men properly named.

Get Ready for Storytime

The main site is complete, references and galleries and all. So what comes next? Next we start having fun. I have a whole new section of the site to roll out that will contain entertaining stories about Buddie’s life. These will be more episodic in nature, sharing some of the incidents that shaped him as a person and Atlanta as a city.

I’m starting with my favorite era, the Atlanta Speedway. We’re going back to 1909 to talk about what inspired the track, how construction played out, what the opening event was like, and how it all fell apart. After that I’ll get into some of the zoo drama, his magic years, and some theories about how he managed—and mismanaged—his money.

Stay tuned!

Sea Travel Interest Page is Live

Asa, Jr., and second wife Florence in front of their yacht in 1928.

I’ve published the interest page about Buddie’s history with boating. Please forgive any typos. I’m trying to push out content while going back to re-read and catch errors after my eyes have gotten a rest from the material.

I have one more interest to add, possibly two. Thanks to another local researcher whose subject overlaps with mine, I’ve recently become aware of an area of activity that was unknown to me until a few days ago. Exciting! The next one coming is about big game hunting. I will then have to decide where this new interest belongs in the taxonomy of the site.

If you have any Candler family stories to share, please contact me through the form on the Contact page. I’m always happy to know more. It helps me to assemble the historic puzzle.

Real Estate Interest Added

I will be adding a few more items to the Interests section over the next week or so. Still to come: sea travel and hunting. For now I’ve added a lot of information about Buddie’s real estate activities with some focus on a few key incidents in the 1920s. It includes a theory about his involvement in the planning and construction of Atlanta’s Fox Theater.

Once I have the remaining two interests published I’ll tackle the remaining timelines in the Timeline section. And then it’s going to get fun because I can start sharing some of the entertaining episodes of his life. You can read about of one of my favorite episodes over on my author blog, but I will be migrating the story in some form over here.