Lemuel Grant - After The War

After The War

The most important shopping area in town was Broad Street and Market Street which were separated by the railroads. A wooden bridge had been built to span the distance; when it burned, Grant designed and built a new one which was completed in July 1865. He was superintendent of the Western & Atlantic and Atlanta & West Point Railroads. In June 1867, he was on the first committee to name streets in Atlanta with Winship and former mayor William Ezzard. In 1870, he was part of the committee to lure Oglethorpe University to Atlanta from Midway. In 1873, he organized the Bank of the State of Georgia. Throughout the 1870s he represented the Third Ward in council and served on the Atlanta Board of Education and in the 1880s he served as water commissioner. In 1882 he donated roughly 100 acres (0.40 km2) in Land Lot 43 for Grant Park, current home of the Cyclorama and ZooAtlanta, later named in his honor, and the deed was issued May 17, 1883.

In 1884, he chartered Westview Cemetery with former mayor James W. English where he was buried after his death in 1893, a highly respected founding father of Atlanta. He is survived by several descendants who currently reside in the Atlanta area and elsewhere. Of note, Bryan M. "Bitsy" Grant, Jr. is his great grandson, and achieved many remarkable feats as a world-renowned tennis athlete, honored in several Halls of Fame. The City of Atlanta recognized him during the 1950s by naming a premier tennis center in his honor on Northside Parkway, Bitsy Grant Tennis Center.