Ocmulgee National Monument Visitors Center - Macon, GA
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nomadwillie
N 32° 50.543 W 083° 36.208
17S E 256329 N 3636817
The Visitor Center at Ocmulgee National Monument near Macon, Georgia is the first, and only, Art Moderne visitors’ building constructed by the Park Service.
Waymark Code: WMTQYB
Location: Georgia, United States
Date Posted: 01/01/2017
Views: 1
The site is a cluster of earthen mounds on the Ocmulgee River that in the 1930s became the largest archaeological dig in the eastern United States. The discoveries brought national attention to the site. From 1933 to 1941 it was one of the largest and most significant archaeological projects of the New Deal, with crews from the Civil Works Administration (CWA), the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), and the Public Works Administration (PWA).
The architect was the unheralded NPS architect James T. Swanson, Jr. His response was unprecedented; he followed none of the policy cues, instead choosing the Art Moderne, a radical departure from long-established Park Service designs. He had worked at Ocmulgee, but records do not reveal how he came to be the designer or how his unconventional design was approved.
Ocmulgee building is a sculptural showpiece, revolutionary in the Park Service in both design and material, with curving cream-colored concrete walls and flowing front stairs. Around the rotunda is a geometric frieze in bold red, patterned on pottery excavated at the site.
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