'Atlanta’ hinted at the haunted history of Lake Lanier. But what’s the real story?

This story has spoilers for the Season 3 premiere of Atlanta.

In the opening scene of the Season 3 premiere for FX’s Atlanta, a white man and a Black man sit in a boat on an unnamed lake, discussing why the murky waters frighten them. The Black man comments that he nearly drowned in the water once, recalling a feeling of being “pulled” underneath. “It’s a whole town underneath us,” the white man says. “The town was Black, too. A self-governed Black town.”