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History Kennesaw, anglicized from the Cherokee word, "Gah-nee-sah" meaning cemetery, has a multi-cultural past marked by constant change. Kennesaw’s history can be divided into four eras, pre Civil War, wartime, post war and the modern era of today. Cobb County was the home of the Creek tribe, descendants of the Mississippian tribes that inhabited the northwest section of Georgia from approximately 800 A.D., who were driven south of the Chattahoochee River by the Cherokee Indians in the early 1800s. Cobb County was still part of the Cherokee Indian Territory when the earliest European settlers came who had won land lotteries used to allocate the Indian lands. The Cherokee land had been divided into 40-acre gold and 160-acre farm tracts with most of Cobb County originally settled by gold-seekers and people looking for good farmland During the pre Civil War era in the 1830’s, the City of Kennesaw was the campsite of an assorted crew of rail workers converged during the railroad building craze. Land which was used for farming was rearranged to accommodate the grading needed to support the railway which progressively became Kennesaw’s biggest catalyst for change. The period during the Civil War campaign has been well documented. A visit to Kennesaw’s Southern Museum of Civil War & Locomotive History Museum or to the Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield Park will detail the important battles fought here. Depicted there is the account of bloody battle led by Confederate States General Joseph E. Johnston, though out-manned and out-gunned, to halt Sherman’s Union army of 100,000 soldiers from further progress. Kennesaw was the last campaign of fighting before Sherman succeeded in burning his way to and through Atlanta to get to the sea. A rebuilding of the City of Kennesaw was necessary and with the help of the railway, re-creation and renovation was possible. Post Civil War Kennesaw mirrored the city in pre war times in that Kennesaw landmarks and landscapes changed to accommodate progress. During the post war era, Kennesaw became organized and incorporated in 1887 with the help and vision of local government officials. Local historians have uncovered old photos of the City Hall building, the old police department building, an old filling station, old homes and churches. All were relatively small by today’s standards but were likely more than sufficient in their day practically speaking. Thanks to Robert Jones’s research and photo collection contributors to the Kennesaw Historical Society, Kennesaw’s vanishing post war history can be visualized by new and interested residents now enjoying the very improvements which displaced the landscape of post war Kennesaw. Today, the modern City of Kennesaw remains and its development continues. To accommodate this development, many of the old country homes have been turned into offices or torn down to make room for stately municipal buildings, libraries and museums. The tiny Kennesaw Methodist Church has become a provisional wedding chapel. Trees which lined the main streets have been torn down for “improvements” such as sidewalks. Commercial buildings filled in empty land lots of post Civil war Kennesaw. The old filling station, where men gathered to listen to the Atlanta Cracker game on the radio, was torn down for the city parking lot. More change in exchange for progress. Gone are the days when children run down to get a drink from the spring down behind the present sawmill. What has not changed is the dedicated collaborative effort of visionary leaders in the community, some with old southern family names, to continue progress and fiscal stability for the betterment of residents and visitors alike taking advantage of all the City of Kennesaw offers, both historically and contemporarily.
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