Marietta Square is a park surrounded on four sides by two story brick storefronts, a shape common to county seats across the South. Many of the buildings date from the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
The town was laid out in 1833, a year after Cobb County was created. Marietta Museum of History curator Amy Reed has said the square's site was picked for the springs near the center of town. When the county courthouse burned in 1848, Mayor John Glover gave the land at the center of the square to the city, on condition it stay a public park. The new courthouse went up across the street instead, and the park is still named for Glover. It has a gazebo used for weddings and a multi tiered fountain. A stage on the far side hosts a concert series.
Sherman's army occupied Marietta during the 1864 Atlanta campaign, and that November General Hugh Kilpatrick's cavalry set the town on fire. The railroad depot just off the square burned in the same campaign and was rebuilt in 1898. It now houses the city's welcome center. Two years earlier, Union raiders in the Great Locomotive Chase spent the night at a hotel by the tracks. That building still stands and now houses the Marietta Museum of History.
None of the storefronts around the square have a modern glass front, and the two story roofline runs unbroken on all four sides.
