The Margaret Mitchell House on Peachtree

Lyrics

Right this way, mind the threshold.
Welcome to 979 Peachtree Street.
Apartment number one.
It doesn't look like much, does it?
She didn't think so either.

She called it "The Dump."
Margaret Munnerlyn Mitchell, that is.
Moved in with her husband, John Marsh, July of 1925.
Just married.
One bedroom, ground floor.
A kitchen so small you could barely turn around.
Gas stove hissing.
She painted a little sign for the door, a private joke between them.
Welcome to The Dump.

And in this room, this tiny, shabby room,
a world was built.
From the clatter of a Remington portable,
from stacks of paper on the floor.
History whispered through the plaster walls, late at night...
from The Dump.

There was no telephone.
Just the work.
The pages piled up on every chair, by the window.
The smell of ribbon ink and winter coal smoke from the street.
The year is 1929.
Peachtree outside is humming with streetcars,
but in here, it's just the sound of the keys.
Click, clack. A sentence at a time.

And in this room, this cramped and borrowed room,
a world was built.
From the clatter of a Remington portable,
from stacks of paper on the floor.
History whispered through the plaster walls, late at night...
from The Dump.

The neighbors in Apartment Two could hear her.
Typing past midnight.
Typing through an illness.
A whole civilization rising and falling,
right through these thin walls.
By 1932, the last page was done.
They packed their bags and left The Dump behind.
Just a quiet, empty room on Peachtree Street.

And now we stand here.
Where the desk once was.
The Remington is under glass now.
But if you listen...
You can almost hear it still.
Thank you for visiting. Please exit through the gift shop.