The two political candidates couldn’t have been more different. One man, descending from a family line of Baptist ministers and championing the values of temperance and chastity, promised law and order. The other belonged to a political party thriving on social disorder and looser interpretations of the laws regarding recreational pursuits.

Such a scenario could be easily imagined in any modern election, but it was exactly the case in 1848, when the newly renamed and incorporated city of Atlanta held its first mayoral election.