Leo Frank Lynching

Leo Frank Lynching is a Georgia historical marker in Cobb County, dedicated 2008.

Across the street from Waffle House on Ga 120 Just W of I-75 in Marietta.

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Near this location on August 17, 1915, Leo M. Frank, the Jewish superintendent of the National Pencil Company in Atlanta, was lynched for the murder of thirteen-year-old Mary Phagan, a factory employee. A highly controversial trial fueled by societal tensions and anti-Semitism resulted in a guilty verdict in 1913. After Governor John M. Slaton commuted his sentence from death to life in prison, Frank was kidnapped from the state prison in Milledgeville and taken to Phagan's hometown of Marietta where he was hanged before a local crowd. Without addressing guilt or innocence, and in recognition of the state's failure to either protect Frank or bring his killers to justice, he was granted a posthumous pardon in 1986.

TodayHistorical map

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Northwestern University Libraries

Historical maps covering this location

1874 · Military Operations of the Atlanta Campaign. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
1891 · Marietta, Georgia (USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection)
1897 · Marietta, Georgia (USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection)
1901 · Marietta, Georgia (USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection)
1910 · National Forests with related projects and data (Northwestern University Libraries)

Military Operations of the Atlanta Campaign, 1874, covering the location of Leo Frank Lynching, with a pin at the marker's coordinates — Military Operations of the Atlanta Campaign, 1874, covering this location. David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries. The pin is ours, placed from the marker's coordinates.

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This historical marker is part of the Georgia Historical Marker Program and was erected by the Georgia Historical Society. Marker texts and locations come from the Society's own marker database.

Leo Frank Lynching

Historical maps covering this location

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