To Some, Olympic Caldron Means More Than An Old Pot Stadium Adornment Stands At Heart Of Hot Keep It Or Dump It Discussions

The caldron that held the beloved Olympic flame for 17 days stands abandoned - stripped off the Olympic Stadium and tossed aside as a legacy few want to claim.

The steel bridge that linked the caldron’s 116-foot tower to the stadium now hangs in the air as a link to nowhere.

Meanwhile, the Atlanta Braves, city officials, Olympic organizers and the artist who designed it continue to bicker over the fate of the structure, which many likened to a giant French fry box.

“It’s a hot potato that everyone is trying to pass around,” said Eva Goss.

Goss, who lives in Atlanta and owns a public relations firm, is one of a handful of citizens trying to come to the caldron’s rescue. Her committee, Keep the Caldron, wants to raise the estimated $250,000 a year needed to insure and maintain the structure.

“These business people are chasing around trying to find a way to solidify all the good stuff that happened here this summer and it’s right in front of their faces,” Goss said.

Attorney Fred Hanna has offered to pay the annual upkeep if the city will let him keep the caldron lighted and post a plaque on the tower dedicating it to his father.

Dan Sewell, a Jasper, Ga., land developer, said the structure would make a nifty attraction at a mountain theme park, and the empty caldron would serve nicely as a bald eagle hatchery.

But the artist who designed the caldron, Siah Armajani of St. Paul, Minn., would rather send it to the scrap heap rather than allow it to be moved.

“It was meant for the neighborhood,” Armajani told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “It was a symbolic act to bridge people together.”

Olympics chief Billy Payne often spoke lovingly of Centennial Olympic Park and its future role as a legacy of the games, but there was no such adoration for the caldron.

But Olympic organizers no longer are in a position to make demands. The caldron sits on property that is owned by the Atlanta-Fulton County Recreation Authority, and the authority has leased the stadium and surrounding property to the Atlanta Braves for the next 30 years.

The Braves and the recreation authority have been bickering since before the games ended who should maintain the caldron.