Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield Park: Cultural Landscape Inventory, Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield Park, National Park Service

Wiss, Janney, Elstner Associates, Inc., contractor; John Milner Associates, Inc., subcontractor

The Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield Park landscape is approximately 2,884.38 acres in size. It is located in Cobb County, Georgia, about three miles west of Marietta and twenty-three miles northwest of the state capital, Atlanta. The park lies within the area of rolling hills and rocky outcrops that marks the southern end of the Appalachian Mountains. The most dominant physical characteristic of the park is a prominent north-to-south ridge, composed of Big Kennesaw and Little Kennesaw mountains, on and around which the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain unfolded. The cultural landscape that comprises the park contains historic buildings, structures, and monuments; historic roads, trails, and road traces; a number of pre-historic and historic archaeological sites, including eleven miles of earthworks; a historic pattern of forest and open fields; and modern visitor amenities, including a Visitor Center and trail heads with parking. Access to the Visitor Center is from Old U.S. Highway 41; other sections of the park are accessible via a number of local roads and trails. Historic resources within the park represent three periods of significance. The first period of significance represents the Atlanta Campaign, May to September 1864, is primarily represented by the Kolb House, earthworks, and roads constructed prior to the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain. The second period of significance, from 1887 through 1917, represents commemoration of the Kennesaw Mountain battlefield by private individuals and associations. This period began with reunions by military units that fought at the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain, and is exemplified by numerous monuments and markers erected on the battlefield as memorials to individuals and units. The third period of significance, from 1917 through 1942, witnessed the management and subsequent development of the battlefield by the Federal government. This period included the administration and development of the battlefield by the War Department and the National Park Service. Few historically significant structures remain to demonstrate the importance of early park development planned by the National Park Service and performed by the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) from 1938 to 1942. The integrity of the landscape of the park to all three periods of significance (1864, 1887–1917, and 1917–1942) remains high because Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield Park retains significant landscape elements. These include elements from the time of the 1864 battle, such as the Kolb House; the Kolb Cemetery; Civil War earthworks; antebellum roads such as Stilesboro, Dallas, Burnt Hickory, and traces of the Old Antebellum Road and the Marietta-Cassville Road; and railroad lines. Significant landscape elements retaining integrity from the 1887–1917 period include the Illinois Monument, the stone tunnel marker, and several other commemorative markers, all located at Cheatham Hill. Elements dating from the 1917–1942 period of park development that retain integrity include Cheatham Hill Drive, portions of the Kennesaw Mountain Drive, and the eight brick entrance signs, all constructed by the CCC. Other sites still under consideration include the CCC Camp Site and the CCC-era buildings of the Maintenance Complex. Three areas of private property that exist within the boundaries of the park contain residential developments built since the 1960s, the construction of which has resulted in a loss of integrity for the historic landscape.

Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield Park: Cultural Landscape Inventory, Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield Park, National Park Service

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