It is the highest point in the core (urban and suburban) metro Atlanta area, and fifth after further-north exurban counties are considered.

Kennesaw Mountain was the site of the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain during the 1864 Atlanta Campaign of the American Civil War, in which the Union forces of General William Tecumseh Sherman launched a bloody frontal attack on the Confederate Army of Tennessee, which was commanded by General Joseph E. Johnston.

Federal judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis, the first commissioner of Major League Baseball, was named after the battle, in which his father nearly lost his left leg.

[4] At the base of the mountain, the park entrance hosts an interpretive center, museum, and numerous self-guided tour trails that document Union General William Tecumseh Sherman's "March to the Sea" during the Civil War.

On September 1, 2016, Adam Young released a ten-track instrumental e-album called Corduroy Road, based on Sherman's March to the Sea.