I remember watching Michael Johnson sprint around the track in Atlanta, his gold chain swinging with every stride and his gold shoes flashing under the stadium lights. To a young viewer, he seemed almost larger than life, gliding around the oval with a confidence that made the impossible look effortless. Like millions of Americans, I watched the 1996 Olympics believing I was witnessing not just extraordinary athletic achievement, but a defining moment for a city on the rise.

Thirty years later, I still remember Johnson’s race. What I understand differently is the city that surrounded it.

In the summer of 1996, Atlanta introduced itself to the world as the capital of the New South: modern, diverse, ambitious, and ready to compete with the world’s great cities. By many measures, the Olympics were exactly the success Atlanta’s leaders envisioned.

The Games accelerated investment in downtown, expanded infrastructure, attracted businesses, strengthened tourism, and elevated Atlanta’s international profile. In the decades that followed, the region became one of the fastest-growing metropolitan areas in America. It emerged as a center for film production, technology, logistics, higher education, and Black entrepreneurship. Atlanta solidified its reputation as the nation’s Black cultural capital, home to thriving historically Black colleges and universities, Fortune 500 companies, influential churches, artists, filmmakers, and political leaders.

The Olympics made Atlanta bigger. But they did not make........

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