Alpharetta agrees to accept historic log cabin

The Alpharetta City Council has voted to accept the Old Milton Log Cabin from the Fulton County Board of Education. AJC FILE

The Alpharetta City Council has voted to accept the Old Milton Log Cabin from the Fulton County Board of Education. AJC FILE

A historic log cabin in Alpharetta may become property of the city by year’s end, now that the City Council has agreed to accept the building from the Fulton County Board of Education.

Under an agreement approved by the council July 24, the Fulton schools will declare the Old Milton Log Cabin surplus property so that the city can move it from the former Milton High School site, to be redeveloped next year as a Science, Technology, Engineering and Math academy. The move must happen by Dec. 31, or the deal is off.

“The cabin is more or less going to become our responsibility,” said Mary Lee, president of the Alpharetta & Old Milton Historical Society.

The cost of the move is estimated at $200,000 to $300,000. So far, the city has pledged $50,000, the Historical Society, $50,000, and the Alpharetta Convention & Visitors Bureau, $15,000. “We can now tell individuals and companies exactly what will happen with the cabin, and we hope we’ll now quickly get the money we need,” Lee said.

The cabin’s new home will be a nearby city park on Milton Avenue.

The structure was built in 1935 by about 100 Milton High School students as a Future Farmers of America project, using logs from a nearby farm and supplies donated by local merchants and farmers. It was a meeting place and, most recently, a teaching museum for the Historical Society. The group has been working to save it for the last two years.