Lois Pattillo was born in Gwinnett County in 1892 to Jack and Laura Wilson Pattillo. By 1910 the Pattillo family resided in Inman Park. As a girl, Lois could be described as a classic socialite participating in a variety of social and philanthropic clubs and being ever present at a wide variety of parties and dances around the city of Atlanta. After high school she attended Agnes Scott College and was an avid golfer, playing in the 1924 Atlanta Women’s Golf Association tournament. So, in 1932 when the Donaldson’s were selling off lots of their family farm, Lois Pattillo would not have been labeled as a typical buyer of a working farmhouse. However, in 1932, Lois purchased the 26-acre lot that contained the Donaldson Farmhouse. She initially bought the property to serve as her summer home, while living in her house located at Peachtree Circle in Atlanta for the rest of the year. Lois hired Francis Palmer Smith, the head of the Georgia Tech School of Architecture, to remodel the farmhouse. He transformed the home from a plantation plain-style farmhouse into a Colonial Revival summer home. Lois also had a barn installed along with a caretaker’s house. Both of which are still on the property today. She also installed a boxwood garden along with a variety of the brick-laid paths that are still present.
Lois drastically changed the property not only in design but also in purpose. While the home here did eventually become Lois’ full-time residence, she never operated the property as a working farm. She did, however, keep her horses on the property and was an avid horseback rider throughout her life. She was also an avid gardener and helped keep up the boxwood garden on the property. It was such a prominent feature during this era of the farm, that it was known as the Boxwood Garden house to the locals.
Lois would marry 4 times throughout her life. She became twice widowed in her time before moving to Dunwoody with both of her husbands passing away in their 30s. She would marry a third time in 1935 only for that marriage to end in divorce shortly thereafter. The fourth time would be the charm for Lois as she married a man by the name of Leland Bannister, a salesman for the Georgia Power Company who lived on Chamblee Dunwoody Road. Lois would go on to take the last name Bannister.
By 1940, Lois and her husband lived here alongside their foster son Marcus C. Wood, and Lois’ aging parents. A few years later, in 1942, Lois would trade this property for a home in Buckhead where she would live out the rest of her days. Lois Pattillo Bannister died in 1959 and is buried in Westview Cemetery in Atlanta.