Nicknames of Atlanta

"Chicago of the South"

"Convention City of Dixie Land"

The City of Love An 1859 industrial journal was among the first to note nicknames for Atlanta, Georgia:^[1]

An orator claimed for it the signification of "a city among the hills" while a writer has declared that it was the opposite of "rus in urbe" ("country in the city") and proclaimed it "'the city in the woods".

Since then, the city has known numerous nicknames. Today, The ATL, and The A are the most prevalent.

Atlanta nicknames

• Contemporary nicknames of Atlanta include, in alphabetical order:
  • The A: It is used in local media such as Only in the A, a video channel shown on MARTA rapid transit trains in Atlanta^[2] and Straight from the A, a popular^[3] Atlanta-based blog targeted at African Americans.^[4] "The A" or "da A" is also used in hip hop and rap songs such as Ludacris and Lloyd's "How We Do It (in da A)", Lil Scrappy's "The A", and T.I.'s "In da A". Atlanta newspaper Creative Loafing listed as one of its "reasons to love Atlanta" that it's "the only city easily identified by just one letter".^[5]
  • A-Town^[6]
  • The ATL,^[7] for its airport code
  • The Big Peach^[8]
  • Black mecca^[9]
  • City in a Forest^[10] or City of Trees,^[11] for its unique tree canopy
  • Dogwood City^[12]
  • Empire City of the South^[13]
  • Hot 'Lanta, first popularized by an instrumental song performed by the Allman Brothers Band. It debuted on their live album At Fillmore East, released in July 1971, the fifth song on the album.^[14][15]
  • Hollywood of the South, became popular recently due to the city's boom in the film industry.^[16]
• Historical nicknames for the city include:
  • Gate City, Gate City of the South, or Gate City of the New South (from Reconstruction through the early 20th century)^[17][18]
  • New York of the South^[19] (1870s–1890s)
  • Chicago of the South (1880s–1900s): for Atlanta's "new men, new industries, new buildings, and new spirit" - though it was often remarked that the nickname was not quite accurate in terms of the size of Atlanta vs. the much larger Chicago^[20][21][22]
  • The City Too Busy to Hate^[23][24] (during Jim Crow and the Civil Rights struggle)
  • Convention City of Dixie (Land) (1910s–1920s)^[25][26]
  • Dogwood City^[12]

Nicknames of other Atlanta areas

• SWATS, The S.W.A.T.S., or S.W.A.T.S. ("Southwest Atlanta, too strong")^[27][28] is, in street, hip-hop, or local contexts, Southwest Atlanta, Capitol View plus territory extending into the adjacent cities of College Park and East Point. The term "SWATS" came into vogue around 1996, and was initially made popular by LaFace Records artist OutKast and Goodie Mob. This was the same time that "ATL" became popular as a nickname for Atlanta as a whole.^[29]

See also

• List of city nicknames in Georgia (U.S. state)

References

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