The house on Canton Street in Alpharetta sat empty and appeared mysterious to many people who passed it every day. Dark and foreboding especially at dusk, the historic Upshaw House, built in 1925, was once the home of Teasley Upshaw (1895-1974), the mayor of Alpharetta for many years. His wife Ruth Summerour Upshaw (1893-1966) taught sixth grade at Milton School, later called Milton High School. They had no children. The last occupant passed away in 2013, and the house remained largely vacant until 2021.
Mayor Upshaw was re-elected several times in the 1940s and 1950s and was considered to be a good, fiscally responsible mayor. Local children were not always so fond of him according to Elsie Knight who grew up on Canton Street and recalls “a sign the mayor put up that girls could not wear shorts in town and boys had to wear shirts. On Halloween we would string firecrackers and make a chain around his house.”
Mr. Upshaw raised potatoes and was known as Tater Teas. He had three large storehouses in back of his house where he cured potatoes which he sold to individuals and stores. Some farmers would take their potatoes to Teasley who would keep them in his storehouses for a fee. He also had a business delivering coal, and he drove a pink Cadillac.
Shack Lewis lived next door to the Upshaws for 20 years beginning when Shack was 8 years old. He and his parents, Nat and Claudia, remember Teasley as a very proper gentleman and good neighbor. He helped Shack and his brother get down from a tree when they were stuck and was tolerant when Lewis’s dogs would dig in his yard. They recall that Teasley always wore a suit and tie. They attended the Methodist Church together. Nat recalls that neither he nor Teasley could carry a tune.
Women in small towns often tended gardens, but in the Upshaw household it was Teasley who had a green thumb. He…
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