Atkins Park, which was first used as farmland, and then purchased by Edwin Wiley Grove (who owned a pharmaceutical company that provided the means for him to own the estate) between 1902 and 1905.
The first use of the land after its formal platting was farmland. Between 1902 and 1905, Edwin Wiley Grove (a St. Louis businessman who later developed the famous Grove Park Inn and the Grove Arcade in Asheville, North Carolina) purchased the land. He founded the Paris Medicine Company, creating and producing its most well-known patent medicine products, Grove's Tasteless Chill Tonic and Laxative Bromo Quinine tablets. Pharmaceutical Manufacturer, Hotelier, Real Estate Developer, Philanthropist Edwin Wiley Grove (18501927) was a self-made millionaire and entrepreneur. 
