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Dunwoody High School opened in 1972 at the intersection of Womack and Vermack Roads. It was the second high school in Dunwoody. The first was Peachtree High School (now Peachtree Middle School) on North Peachtree Road. Peachtree opened in 1968.

In 1988, the two high schools merged, with Peachtree becoming a middle school and Dunwoody remaining a high school. Prior to these schools opening, students from Dunwoody attended Chamblee High School.

Ken Anderson, a wonderful source for Dunwoody history, told me several years ago that the land where Dunwoody High School is located was once home to the Martin farm. He remembered they lived on the land in the 1940s and 1950s, but they owned that land at least as early as the 1920s.

Census records show that Harvey Hill and Alma (Berta) Crawford Martin lived there along with their children Floyd, Wyatt, and Ruth in 1920.  Their home was a one-story farmhouse with a central hallway.  The Martin’s farm extended from what is now Mount Vernon Road down to Womack Road.  

Harvey Hill Martin was born in 1877 in Milton County in what is now often referred to as Sandy Springs corridor, between Dunwoody Club Drive and the Chattahoochee River. The area is now in Fulton County but was once part of Milton County. Martin’s father, Ambry Martin, owned fifty-four acres in Milton County. Berta and Harvey married in 1901. 

Jane Anderson Autry and Carolyn Anderson Parker recall going to school with the grandchildren of Berta and Harvey, the children of Floyd and Maggie Mae Martin. There were two brothers, Herbert and Dorris, and daughter Ethel.  The Anderson children’s father, Walter, Sr., was the pastor of Dunwoody Baptist Church, so the Andersons were often invited for Sunday dinner at the Martin home.  Autry shared memories of Mrs. Martin’s delicious biscuits and Parker remembers her delectable pies.  

Carlton Renfroe, who moved to Tilly Mill Road with his family in 1941, remembered the Martin family, their home and barn.  He said the driveway entrance was along Vermack Road and the house was perched in the same spot as today’s high school.  That part of the road was known by locals as Martin Road, according to Carolyn Parker.  

Herbert and Dorris Martin played on the Dunwoody sandlot baseball team in the 1940’s.  Dunwoody’s team played games against other community amateur teams.  The field was located along what is now Dunwoody Village Parkway.  Neighboring communities of Doraville and Sandy Springs also had teams, as well as Naval Air Station Atlanta and Lawson General Hospital in the 40s. 

The 1940 census shows the Martin family of Floyd and Maggie Martin, along with Herbert, Dorris and Ethel. Floyd’s occupation is caretaker of a country estate. There were a few country or summer homes owned by Atlanta families in the 1940s, so it is hard to say which one Floyd may have worked at, possibly the Wardlaws, DuBose, Lane, Maddox, Akers, Nunnally, Norris, or Brandon. There were quite a few during the 1930s and 40s.

As usual, the Martin family is tied to other early families of Dunwoody.  Maggie Mae Eidson Martin was the daughter of Marcellus Eidson and Margaret Elizabeth Warnock Eidson.  Maggie’s great uncle Zachariah Eidson donated the land for the first Dunwoody School, located where the Spruill Center for the Arts and Dunwoody Library are today. 

Berta Martin died in 1957 and Harvey Martin died in 1958.  Both are buried at the historic New Hope cemetery, located along Chamblee Dunwoody Road behind the KinderCare Learning Center.  

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