Digital Project To Capture Hospital’s Origins And Legacy In Old Fourth Ward
By Adrianne Murchison
Publish Date: September 2, 2025
The former Atlanta Medical Center stood for more than a century in the heart of Old Fourth Ward, its story intertwined with the city’s own. Soon, that story will be told in a new way.
A digital project on BLVDNEXT will unfold over the coming months, tracing the hospital’s transformation from its humble beginnings as a faith-based infirmary to its decades as a major medical center and, now, its next life as a mixed-use community.
Leading the project are Kevin Sparrow, Ph.D., a political science professor at Georgia State University, and Renee Lewis Glover, a longtime Atlanta business and civic leader whose roots in the neighborhood and her transformational work, as leader of the Atlanta Housing Authority, will bring a deeper understanding to the work.
For Glover, the hospital’s history cannot be separated from the Old Fourth Ward itself — from the Civil Rights Movement and Sweet Auburn to the ongoing redevelopment pressures reshaping the area today.
“This project will illustrate how the hospital and the neighborhood have shaped lives across generations,” she said.
The project will combine archival research with personal stories, spotlighting the accomplishments of doctors, nurses, patients, and nearby residents. Visitors will be able to click through historic photos, and explore archival materials as well as interviews with historians that bring the past to life. In addition, visitors will be able to explore digital time capsules.
“We really want this to be both a compelling visual and riveting narrative,” Sparrow said.
The hospital’s roots date back to 1901, when Dr. Len Broughton, a physician and Baptist minister, opened the Tabernacle Baptist Infirmary and training school for nurses in a rented house on Courtland Street, according to the Material Religion of American History Project.
By 1913, the Georgia Baptist Convention had purchased the facility, renaming it Georgia Baptist Hospital, eventually relocating it to the Old Fourth Ward, according to the Georgia Baptist Mission Board.
In 1997, the facility became Atlanta Medical Center under Tenet Healthcare.
“The nursing school became the Baptist nursing program that is at Mercer University now,” Sparrow said of a 2001 transition. “The nursing school became the Baptist nursing program that is at Mercer University now,” Sparrow said of a 2001 transition.
Tenet later sold the hospital to Wellstar Health Systems in 2016, and by 2022, financial losses and aging infrastructure led to its closure.
The storytelling project will offer an important contribution to Atlanta’s recorded history, Glover said, adding, “I’m very excited about this project, because to quote Shakespeare, “past is prologue.”
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