Atlanta was one of nine cities with sites selected for landscape makeovers as part of the national Keep America Beautiful's Great America Cleanup program for which Troy-Bilt is a sponsor. Keep Atlanta Beautiful was called upon to help in the site selection process and provided assistance in installing a reading garden at The Wren's Nest.

Atlanta's Wren's Nest museum and story telling center, once home to famed Sothern storyteller, Joel Chandler Harris, unveiled the new community reading garden March 16, 2006, that dovetails with the historic site's new mission and may grow its chances of long-term survival.

"It just enhances the neighborhood. It lets people know we have a quiet, serene place of beauty," said Marshall Thomas, chairman of the Joel Chandler Harris Association, a nonprofit that manages the privately owned museum.

The garden, a gift from national lawn-and-garden equipment manufacturer Troy-Bilt, is an improvement that Wren's Nest officials say complements the site's redefined mission.

Executive Director Sharon Crutchfield said she considers the museum, the oldest house museum in Atlanta, one of the city's best-kept secrets.

Located in the historic West End neighborhood, the Queen Anne-style farmhouse was bought by Harris in 1883, became a museum in 1913 and was designated a historic landmark in 1962. Harris died in Atlanta in 1908.