The corn and potatoes that J.C. Hyde routinely hauled to the Marietta Farmers Market until his death four years ago at age 94 could not have been sweeter than the legacy he and his dirt-farming brother have left along the Chattahoochee River. Thanks to J.C.'s vision and stubbornness, 135 acres of Cobb County farmland will remain a joyful respite in the heart of metro Atlanta.
After years of pressure from developers to turn the prime real estate into more mega-mansions along the river, the Hyde family and a coalition of government and private land preservation groups have agreed to keep Hyde Farm as it has been for more than a century. All the parties involved in the $14.2 million deal deserve thanks for securing one of the most important greenspace acquisitions in the region.
It wasn't easy, and for a while it appeared the deal might not happen.
The farm had been connected to the Hyde family since 1874. J.C. and his brother, Buck, made a deathbed promise to their father, Jesse, that they would keep it a working farm. The brothers lived on the land in a cabin heated by a potbellied stove and toted water from a nearby well.
After Buck died in 1987, J.C. had inheritance tax bills mounting to nearly $600,000 because nearby residential development had greatly increased the land's value. To keep his promise and pay his taxes, J.C. agreed in 1993 to sell 40 acres of riverfront to the Trust for Public Land for $1.2 million and give the trust the right of first refusal on the remaining 95 acres. He kept farming it until he died in 2004.
The following year the Trust exercised its option on the remaining acreage for $12 million. But the extended Hyde family balked at the amount, claiming they had offers for up to $18 million. They went to court.
Meanwhile, the Cobb County Commission and the National Park Service kept working on a plan, and the Friends of Hyde Farm kept raising money.
A key development came in 2006, when Cobb voters wisely approved a $40 million bond issue to acquire parkland. The county will put up $5 million from the bond issue, and the park service is expected to put up about $6 million. The remainder of the purchase price will come from the Trust's Chattahoochee River Land Protection project.
If all goes as planned, Cobb County will team up with the National Park Service to create a passive recreation and educational center after the agencies buy the farm from the Trust. It should become a welcome respite for walkers, joggers, birders, schoolchildren and city dwellers who want to see how a farm operated in the early 1900s. It could open for the public sometime next year.
In a metropolitan area that has too often skinned its rolling farmland brown, covered it with strip malls and mini-mansions and replanted it with fescue, Hyde Farm remains a living symbol of what life once was on the banks of the Chattahoochee. While J.C. Hyde no longer makes trips to the farmers market, he and his family have preserved a bountiful harvest for generations to come.
