The Birmingham age-herald., 1918-11-01
MEN, WOMEN
 AND THINGS

''The Atlanta spirit Yes. I know VIZ have been advised to cut out any refer ence to the status of mind which has made Atlanta what she is, but having been over there recently l am going to talk about it just a bit.
 Someone has written series of articles about "the flavor of cities'' A city, like an individual. can have personality. l sometimes gets on my nerves. but Bir mingham is big enough to be able to look her sister city in the face without evil dencing any jealousy.
 Now as fair minded Birminghamer l am willing to admit that the Gate City is a marvel in many ways. I have been trying to get the psychology Of the At lanta spirit" and l believe have lo- cated 1t. Atlanta in the very begin ming, that is, after she changed her name, got vision that she was to be a bis city.
 I remember my father used to tell me how as a young man he left Washington, Ga. his birthplace, after graduation to seek place to practice medicine, and went to Marthasville (now Atlanta), but found it such a scraggy village that he came to Alabama where he settled and reared family. This is how I escaped Icing an Atlantian.
 
 We hear lot of talk about German manifest destiny to dominate the world Sure, we speak of it as a Teutonic ob- session--but there is an Atlanta cult which began in it's infancy and has grown and grown that she was to be not only the Gate City, of the .outh, but It's very heart.
 We laugh about hot air" and think it, waste of breath, but if you want to know that it does not evaporate into the atmosphere but if sent out in sufficient volume solidifies, all you have to do is to gaze on Atlanta, for she has butt upon it a city which is truly one of the bright spots among our southern cities.
 Hot air and the will to back it up is what has made her what she is A quar- ter of a century ago she got it into her head that she was to be the biggest cit- in the south and she kept bell wing # until after while all Georgia was say. Ing it and it wasn't long before nearly the whole of the gulf states was root ing for the Georgia town-and if it hadn't been for Birmingham her dream might have come true.
 "The Atlanta spirit was d miracle worker. It got me before I knew it.. I my law shingle in the famous town of ! orackerdom. was just from New No,k. where I had been the head of T depart ment in a big Wall street law firm. and had gotten it into my head that Gotham was the capital of the universe, ard that dear old Broadway" was the one street 1 in all the world I really believed it all though I had spent years Tn the great cities of Europe.
 
 l I arrived in the Gate City and secured an office in the Equitable, the only Of. | flee building in the town. I looked out over the city and wondered how l was l ever going to set reconciled to such a small place, but 1 hadn't been in the vil- l lage more than two weeks before l had been hypnotized. It must have been in 1 the Atmosphere, for l was wrrnr back to friends in New York if they wanted to see real live metropolis they ought to come to Atlanta.
 This is what the Atlanta sp.nt d7 to me, but the great idea on which at' lanta is built up is--get everything fol | Atlanta and always keep Atlanta mei ] and Atlanta goods to the front. l was at . meeting in Atlanta the other day