Odes to Avondale Estates · Track 1 · opener
A Candy Magnate's Stratford
Avondale Estates' opening — George Francis Willis, the wholesale candy magnate who in 1924 bought 1,000 acres east of Decatur and commissioned a planned town modeled on Stratford-on-Avon, England. The deliberate vision of an American Tudor village built from scratch, Willis paying for every brick. Sisukiro hands the town its founding story.
Lyrics
Before the lake, there was just a hollow. Before the swans, just red Georgia clay. Before the Tudors, a thousand acres waiting for a strange, sweet dream to find its way. His name was George Francis Willis. He sold sugar by the ton. A wholesale candy magnate, staring at the Southern sun. And in his mind, he saw a different river. Not the Chattahoochee, but the Avon. He saw the gables of Stratford, and a postcard town was drawn. 1924. A candy magnate’s Stratford, born of will and whim. Every slate roof, every lead-paned window, built from a sweet and profitable dream. A thousand acres of old England, rising from the turpentine and pine. George Willis bought the land, he bought the bricks, and he drew a brand new timeline. The blueprints smelled of money, unrolled on a wooden table. The surveyors drove their iron stakes. They carved a piece of Warwickshire from a forgotten fable, for goodness gracious sakes. From Ingleside’s quiet farmland, a grid of streets was planned. A half-timbered vision, willed right from his hand. He paid for every single nail, every pane of glass, to make the storybook come true, and make the feeling last. 1924. A candy magnate’s Stratford, born of will and whim. Every slate roof, every lead-paned window, built from a sweet and profitable dream. A thousand acres of old England, rising from the turpentine and pine. George Willis bought the land, he bought the bricks, and he drew a brand new timeline. Did he ever stand on the empty ridge, at dusk, and hear the sound? The faint clink of a surveyor's chain, on the soon-to-be-hallowed ground. A whole town built from a memory, a place he'd never known. A sweet, imported ghost, given Georgia brick and bone. A stage set for a life. The first stone laid in 1924. Paid for in sugar. The first roof slated in 1924. Paid for in dreams. A candy magnate’s Stratford. And so it begins.