Few have gone through more for a glass of wine. On a late April Saturday afternoon, 1994, unsuspecting 24-year-old Kim Christian turned out of her Monroe Drive apartment complex and into a traffic jam of nearly mythological proportions.
She would sit in a sea of idling cars and uninhibited humanity for much of the afternoon, returning from the four-block (round trip) drive to the liquor store some four hours later.
"I had no idea Freaknik was so big," said Christian, who had just moved from Oakland. "At first it was kind of festive but then it got out of hand."
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She was one of the lucky ones. High school senior Heather Davis, who attended Alexander High in Douglas County, missed her prom. Weddings were delayed. Emergency services were severely hampered.
But no one had it worse than the city's sanitation workers, who worked two days and two nights just to clean up all the garbage left behind by the Spring Break revelers.
Freaknik 1995 was an even bigger party, with more than 200,000 mostly black college students flocking to Atlanta. The city was determined to curb the festival in 1996; police were instructed to make things uncomfortable for anyone in a car. Movement was restricted to the point that partying became a chore.
"I was disappointed by what it became, " Sharon Toomer, one of the founders of Freaknik, told the AJC two years ago. "Its original purpose was to be an annual event to encourage camaraderie between historically black colleges. It was a rare opportunity for black college students to get together."
By the mid-90s Freaknik was out of control -- Spring Break on Human Growth Hormone. The streets became literal parking lots and the behavior of some cruisers was lewd enough to make Tiger Woods blush.
Peachtree, Cascade, Piedmont and Monroe were favored destinations. So were Underground, Lenox Square and Greenbriar (where a Rich's was looted during Freaknik ‘95).
That year police reported more than 2,000 crimes, from indecent exposure to looting to rape. A crackdown was inevitable, though, some 15 years later, not all the memories are bad.
"Freaknik was funny, silly and, at times, frustrating and scary, " said Angelo Fuster, a top aide to former Atlanta Mayor Bill Campbell. "I do not have terrible memories of it. In the right place, in the right venue, it would have been a great party."
That won't be Atlanta in 2010, vow city officials, who are not permitting any outdoor events associated with this week's dual Freaknik events. "There will not be a takeover of Atlanta under my watch," Mayor Kasim Reed said Wednesday.
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