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Jan 1, 1000
Archic
The early Arhaic period in Georgia and everywhere else in the eastern united states was appoximataly 10,000 to 8000 year ago. At that time most of Georgia was covered with oak- hickory hardwood forests. -
Jan 1, 1000
Paleo
The Paleo - indian period spans from approxamately 15000 B.C to the end of the the Pleistocenetce age about 7000 B.C. -
Jan 1, 1000
Woodland
The woodland Period of Georgia is broadly dated from around 1000 B.C to 900 A.D. -
May 25, 1539
Herando De Soto
De Soto's fleet signed the western coast of flordia near tampa on may 25 1539. he landed with about 600 men and about 220 horses and from there heproceceded northwesterm to presentday tallahasse where he and his men spent the winter of 1539 - 40 in the cheifdone of Apalachee -
John Reynolds
John Reynolds, a captain in the British royal navy, served as Georgia's first royal governor from late 1754 to early 1757.
Little is known about Reynolds's early life except that his birth occurred in England circa 1713 and that at fifteen years of age he volunteered for service in the British navy. His career advanced slowly but steadily. He obtained command of his first vessel, the fireship Scipio, in 1745, and the next year he served as captain of the Arundel, a forty-gun vessel. -
Henry Ellis
Henry Ellis, the second royal governor of Georgia, has been called "Georgia's second founder." Georgia had no self-government under the Trustees (1732-52), and the first royal governor, John Reynolds (1754-57), failed as an administrator. Under the leadership of Ellis (1757-60) Georgians learned how to govern themselves, and they have been doing so ever since. -
Charter of 1732
On September 17, 1730, the associates presented a petition for a charter to the Privy Council, Parliament's executive body, headed by the chancellor of the exchequer, Robert Walpole. The petition was routinely passed on to the notoriously inefficient Board of Trade, which dawdled for a year without acting. Walpole, the prime minister, was less than eager to challenge the Spanish, who had a prior claim to the region requested by the petitioners. -
Georgia Founded
As vieitary, Social reformer , and Military leader. James Oglethope concvivad his plan to establish the colony of Georgia -
Capital moved to Louisville
In February 1733 James Oglethorpe and the first Georgia colonists landed at Yamacraw Bluff, where they laid out the new settlement of Savannah. Three months later, Oglethorpe and the Yamacraw chief Tomochichi signed a treaty, which ceded Creek lands from the Savannah to the Altamaha rivers, inland from the coast as far as the tide flowed, to the Trustees. -
Salzbugers Arrive
The first group of Salzburgers sailed from England to Georgia in 1734, arriving in Charleston, South Carolina, on March 7, then proceeding to Savannah on March 12. They were met by James Oglethorpe, the founder of the Georgia colony, who assigned them a home about twenty-five miles upriver in a low-lying area on Ebenezer Creek. -
James Wright
Wright was born in London, England, on May 8, 1716, to Isabella and Robert Wright. He came to South Carolina in 1730 when his father was appointed chief justice of the colony. By 1740 Wright was a practicing attorney in South Carolina and had been appointed acting attorney general. On August 14, 1741, he entered Gray's Inn in London and was called to the bar. -
Highland Scots Arrive
A majority of the immigrant white population traveled to Georgia because of the availability and cheapness of land, which was bought, bartered, or bullied from surrounding Indians: more than 1 million acres in the 1730s, almost 3.5 million acres in 1763, and a further cession of more than 2 million acres in 1773. -
American Revolution
The
This map shows the 1830 boundaries of the Cherokee Nation in northwestern Georgia. Map published by Anthony Finley Company.
Map of Cherokee Nation, 1830
Cherokees, one of the most populous Indian societies in the Southeast during the eighteenth century, played a key role in Georgia's early history. They were close allies of the British for much of the eighteenth century. During the Seven Years' War (1756-63) and American Revolution (1775-83), a breakdown in relations with the British and th -
Elijah Clarke/ Kettle Cr.
Clarke's name appears on a petition in support of the king's government in 1774. However, he subsequently joined the rebels and, as a militia captain, received a wound fighting the Cherokees in 1776. The following year, he commanded militia against Creek raiders. As a lieutenant colonel in the state minutemen, Clarke received another wound at the Battle of Alligator Bridge, Florida. Then on February 14, 1779, as a lieutenant colonel of militia, Clarke led a charge in the rebel victory at Kettle -
Constitutional Convention
Constitutional conventions are a distinctly American political innovation, first appearing during the era of the Revolutionary War (1775-83). Georgia was among the first states to use a meeting of delegates to create a constitution. In October 1776, just three months after the American colonies declared independence from Great Britain, Georgia's first constitutional convention met and produced the state's inaugural constitution, known as the Constitution of 1777. -
Georgia Ratifies Constitution
Georgia's first attempt at constitutional government was initiated in April 1776 by the Provincial Congress called by the Georgia Trustees in response to a series of mass meetings held throughout the colony. This document provided a framework for the transition from colony to state. Soon after Georgia accepted the Declaration of Independence, its first state constitutional convention was organized. Completed in February 1777 and executed without having been submitted to voters for ratification, -
Yazzo Land Fraud
The Yazoo land fraud was one of the most significant events in the post–Revolutionary War (1775-83) history of Georgia. The bizarre climax to a decade of frenzied speculation in the state's public lands, the Yazoo sale of 1795 did much to shape Georgia politics and to strain relations with the federal government for a generation. -
University of Georgia founded
The University of Georgia (UGA) is the oldest, largest, and most comprehensive educational institution in Georgia. Chartered by the Georgia General Assembly in 1785, UGA was the first university in America to be created by a state government, and the principles undergirding its charter helped lay the foundation for the American system of public higher education. -
Austin Dabney
On
Austin Dabney, a Georgia slave, earned freedom in exchange for his service in the patriot army. Dabney was banned from participating in the land lottery open to Revolutionary War veterans in 1819, but the legislature granted him acreage in Washington County in 1821.
Land Grant to Former Slave
August 14, 1786, Dabney became the only African American to be granted land, fifty acres, by the state of Georgia in recognition of his military service during the Revolution. -
Dred Scott Case
The first Georgian appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court, James Moore Wayne served a historically long tenure, from 1835 to 1867, during a tumultuous time in U.S. history. Although his legal legacy and impact are limited, he played a significant, if understated, role on the Court at a time when its position within the nation's governmental system was still developing. Early Life and Education Wayne was born in Savannah in 1790 to Elizabeth Clifford and Richard Wayne. -
Eli Whitney and the Cotton Gin
Eli Whitney, a Massachusetts native, only spent a few months living in Georgia, but during that time, in 1793, he invented the cotton gin. Whitney's machine expedited the extraction of seeds from upland cotton, making the crop profitable and contributing to its expansion across the South. -
Dahlonega Gold Rush
Yet another finds a young Benjamin Parks kicking up an unusual-looking stone while on the lookout for deer west of the Chestatee River in 1828. Despite the popularity of these claims, no documented evidence for gold in Georgia is found until August 1, 1829, when a Milledgeville newspaper, the Georgia Journal, ran the following notice. -
Worcester V. Georgia
In the court case Worcester v. Georgia, the U.S. Supreme Court held in 1832 that the Cherokee Indians constituted a nation holding distinct sovereign powers. Although the decision became the foundation of the principle of tribal sovereignty in the twentieth century, it did not protect the Cherokees from being removed from their ancestral homeland in the Southeast. In the 1820s and 1830s Georgia conducted a relentless campaign to remove the Cherokees, who held territory within the borders. -
Henry McNeal Turner
Turner had been converted during a Methodist revival and decided he would one day become a preacher. After receiving his preacher's license in 1853, he traveled throughout the South as an itinerant evangelist. -
Trail of tears
In his 1942 painting Cherokee Trail of Tears, Robert Lindneux depicts the forced journey of the Cherokees in 1838 to present-day Oklahoma. -
Compromise of 1850
The sectional crisis of the 1850s, in which Georgia played a pivotal role, led to the outbreak of the Civil War (1861-65). Southern politicians struggled during the crisis to prevent northern abolitionists from weakening constitutional protections for slavery . During this period, however, and for much of the antebellum era, Georgians maintained a relatively moderate political course, often frustrating the schemes of southern radicals -
Georgia Platform
With the nation facing the potential threat of disunion over the passage of the Compromise of 1850, Georgia, in a special state convention, adopted a proclamation called the Georgia Platform. The act was instrumental in averting a national crisis. Slavery had been at the core of sectional tensions between the North and South. New territorial gains, westward expansion, and the hardening of regional attitudes toward the spread of slavery p -
Kansas-Nebraska Act
An 1856 political cartoon attacks the proslavery platform of the Democratic Party. In the lower right corner, two slaves kneel before an overseer. One asks, "Is this democracy?" The overseer responds, "We will subdue you." In the left background a Kansas settlement burns, representing the violent response to the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854. This act, endorsed by Democrats, allowed for popular sovereignty to decide the slavery question in the western territories. -
Election of 1860
The sectional crisis of the 1850s, in which Georgia played a pivotal role, led to the outbreak of the Civil War (1861-65). Southern politicians struggled during the crisis to prevent northern abolitionists from weakening constitutional protections for slavery . During this period, however, and for much of the antebellum era, Georgians maintained a relatively moderate political course, often frustrating the schemes of southern radicals. -
Battle of Gettysburg
In July of 1863, General Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia of 75,000 men and the 97,000 man Union Army of the Potomac, under George G. Meade, concentrated together at Gettysburg and fought the Battle of Gettysburg. -
Andersonville Prison Camp
By the time it closed in early May 1865, those numbers, along with the sanitation, health, and mortality problems stemming from its overcrowding. -
Sherman's Atlanta Campaign
The March to the Sea, the most destructive campaign against a civilian population during the Civil War (1861-65), began in Atlanta on November 15, 1864, and concluded in Savannah on December 21, 1864. Union general William T. Sherman abandoned his supply line and marched across Georgia to the Atlantic Ocean to prove to the Confederate population that its government could not protect the people from invaders. He practiced psychological warfare; he believed that by marching an army across -
Sherman's March to the Sea
The purpose of this “March to the Sea” was to frighten Georgia’s civilian population into abandoning the Confederate cause. -
Emancipation Proclamation
Emancipation did not come suddenly or easily to Georgia. The liberation of the state's more than 400,000 slaves began during the chaos of the Civil War (1861-65) and continued well into 1865. Emancipation also demanded the reconfiguration of the full range of social and economic relations. What would replace slavery was unclear. Former slaves, ex-slaveholders, and the Northerners responsible for enforcing freedom had their own ideas about what the future should bring. -
Battle of Chickamauga
The Battle of Chickamauga, the biggest battle ever fought in Georgia, took place on September 18-20, 1863, during the Civil War (1861-65). With 34,000 casualties, it is generally accepted as the second bloodiest engagement of the war; only the Battle of Gettysburg in Pennsylvania, with 51,000 casualties, was deadlier. -
Union Blockadle of Georgia
The battle between ship and shore on the coast of Confederate Georgia was a pivotal part of the Union strategy to subdue the state during the Civil War (1861-65). U.S. president Abraham Lincoln's call at the start of the war for a naval blockade of the entire Southern coastline took time to materialize, but by early 1862, under Union general Winfield Scott's "Anaconda Plan," the Union navy had positioned a serviceable fleet off the coast of the South's most prominent Confederate. -
Battle of Antietam
A veteran of the Mexican War (1846-48) and a Republican politician, James Longstreet was one of the most prominent and controversial figures of the Civil War (1861-65). Early Life Born on January 8, 1821, in the Edgefield district of South Carolina, not far from Augusta, Longstreet always considered himself a Georgian. His parents, Mary Anna Dent and James L. Longstreet, owned a cotton plantation in northeast Georgia, where as a boy he thrived in the rough frontierlike conditions. -
Thirteenth Amendment
To the United States Constitution abolished slavery and involuntary servitude, except as punishment for a crime. -
Freedman's Bureau
The Freedmen's Bureau was created in 1865 during the Lincoln administration, by an act of Congress called the Freedman's Bureau Bill. -
International Cotten Expostion
These events provided civic leaders with a showcase to lure visitors, who were urged to come and do business in the host location. In the years following the Civil War (1861-65), Atlanta's leaders hosted a series of three "cotton expositions" that were important to the city's recovery and economic development -
Ku Klux Klan Formed
From 1868 through the early 1870s the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) functioned as a loosely organized group of political and social terrorists. The Klan's goals included the political defeat of the Republican Party and the maintenance of absolute white supremacy in response to newly gained civil and political rights by southern blacks after. -
Fourteenth Amendment
Addresses citizenship rights and equal protection of the laws, and was proposed in response to issues related to former slaves following the American Civil War. -
Fifteenth Amendment
The United States Constitution prohibits the federal and state governments from denying a citizen the right to vote based on that citizen's "race, color, or previous condition of servitude." -
John and Lugenia Hope
Lugenia Burns Hope was an early-twentieth-century social activist, reformer, and community organizer. Spending most of her career in Atlanta, she worked for the improvement of black communities through traditional social work, community health campaigns, and political pressure for better education and infrastructure. -
Holocaust
The impact of the Holocaust on Georgians during WWII was minimal. However, Georgia did have a substantial and influential Jewish population, which had been a part of Georgia history since its founding in 1875. Jewish citizens would continue to settle throughout Georgia over the next two centuries. -
Tom Watson and the Populists
In 1892 Georgia politics was shaken by the arrival of the Populist Party. Led by the brilliant orator Thomas E. Watson this new party mainly appealed to white farmers, many of whom had been impoverished by debt and low cotton prices in the 1880s and 1890s. Populism, which directly challenged the dominance of the Democratic Party, threatened to split the white vote in Georgia. -
Booker T. Washigton
On September 18, 1895, the African American educator and leader Booker T. Washington delivered his famous "Atlanta Compromise" speech at the Cotton States and International Exposition in Atlanta. Considered the definitive statement of what Washington termed the "accommodationist" strategy of black response to southern racial tensions, it is widely regarded as one of the most significant speeches in American history. -
Missouri Compromise
On September 18, 1895, the African American educator and leader Booker T. Washington delivered his famous "Atlanta Compromise" speech at the Cotton States and International Exposition in Atlanta. Considered the definitive statement of what Washington termed the "accommodationist" strategy of black response to southern racial tensions, it is widely regarded as one of the most significant speeches in American history. Two years earlier, Washington had spoken in Atlanta. -
1906 Atlanta Riot
During the Atlanta race riot that occurred September 22-24, 1906, white mobs killed dozens of blacks, wounded scores of others, and inflicted considerable property damage. Local newspaper reports of alleged assaults by black males on white females were the catalyst for the riot, but a number of underlying causes lay behind the outbreak of the mob violence. -
Ivan Allen Jr.
Ivan Allen Jr. served as mayor of Atlanta from 1962 to 1970. He is credited with leading the city through an era of significant physical and economic growth and with maintaining calm during the civil rights movement. While other southern cities experienced recurring violence, Atlanta leaders, led in part by Mayor Allen, were able to broker more peaceful paths to integration. Allen was born in Atlanta on March 15, 1911, the only son of Ivan Allen Sr -
Leo Frank Case
On April 26, 1913, Mary Phagan, the child of tenant farmers who had moved to Atlanta for financial gain, went to the pencil factory to pick up her $1.20 pay for the twelve hours she had worked that week. Leo Frank, the superintendent of the factory, paid her. He was the last person to acknowledge having seen Phagan alive. -
Carl Vinson
In 1912 Vinson suffered his only defeat at the hands of the voters of middle Georgia in a political career that spanned six decades. His bid for a third term in the legislature lost by five votes, apparently the result of voter backlash over reapportionment. The governor then appointed him judge of the Baldwin County court. Soon afterward, however, when the U.S. representative from the Tenth District resigned, Vinson ran for the vacant House seat. Easily defeating three wealthy opponents, he was -
World War I
Georgia played a significant role during America's participation in World War I (1917-18). The state was home to more training camps than any other state and, by the war's end, it had contributed more than 100,000 men and women to the war effort. Georgia also suffered from the effects of the influenza pandemic, a tragic maritime disaster, local political fights, and wartime homefront restrictions. War Sentiment in Georgia As newspaper headlines around the world reported the assassination -
WEB DuBois
Robert S. Abbott, a Georgia native, was a prominent journalist who founded the Chicago Defender in 1905. He is pictured (second row, fifth from right) in June 1918 at a meeting of black leaders in Washington, D.C. Prominent historian and educator W. E. B. Du Bois stands in the first row, fourth from the right. -
Alonzo Herndon
An African American barber and entrepreneur, Alonzo Herndon was founder and president of the Atlanta Life Insurance Company, one of the most successful black-owned insurance businesses in the nation. At the time of his death in 1927, he was also Atlanta's wealthiest black citizen, owning more property than any other African American. Admired and respected by many, he was noted for his involvement in and support of local institutions and charities devoted to advancing African American business -
Great Depression
The stock market crash in the waning days of October 1929 heralded the beginning of the worst economic depression in U.S. history. The Great Depression hit the South, including Georgia, harder than some other regions of the country, and in fact only worsened an economic downturn that had begun in the state a decade earlier. U.S. president Franklin D. Roosevelt's programs for economic relief and recovery, known collectively as the New Deal, arrived late in Georgia and were only sporadically. -
Andrew Young
Andrew Young's lifelong work as a politician, human rights activist, and businessman has been in great measure responsible for the development of Atlanta's reputation as an international city. Early Life and Career Andrew Jackson Young Jr. was born on March 12, 1932, in New Orleans, Louisiana, into a prosperous middle-class family. His mother, Daisy Fuller, was a schoolteacher, and his father, Andrew Young, was a dentist. Born during the depths of the Great Depression and Jim Crow -
Civilian Conservation Corps
Among the numerous New Deal programs of Franklin D. Roosevelt's presidency, the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) is remembered as one of the most popular and effective. Established on March 31, 1933, the corps's objective was to recruit unemployed young men (and later, out-of-work veterans) for forestry, erosion control, flood prevention, and parks development. -
Pearl Harbor
Georgia's remarkable economic progress in the late twentieth century started with the influx of federal dollars for welfare and defense in the Franklin D. Roosevelt presidential era (1933-45). Between 1942 and 1945 the Bell Aircraft Corporation transformed Marietta from the small seat of rural Cobb County to one of the main industrial centers of the Sunbelt. After assembly lines began functioning in the spring of 1943, Bell employees supplied the U.S. Army Air Forces with 663 Boeing-designed. -
World War II
Southern states were critical to the war effort during World War II (1941-45) and none more so than Georgia. Some 320,000 Georgians served in the U.S. Armed Forces during World War II -
Hamiltion Holmes and Charlayne Hunter
Charlayne Hunter-Gault holds a place in Georgia civil rights history as one of the first two African American students admitted to the University of Georgia. Also known for her career as an award-winning journalist, Hunter-Gault is respected for her work on television and in print. Childhood and Family Charlayne Hunter was born on February 27, 1942, in Due West, South Carolina. -
Eugene Talmadge
A controversial and colorful politician, Eugene Talmadge played a leading role in the state's politics from 1926 to 1946. During his three terms as state commissioner of agriculture and three terms as governor, his personality and actions polarized voters into Talmadge and anti-Talmadge factions in the state's one-party politics of that era. He was elected to a fourth term as the state's chief executive in 1946 but died before taking office. -
Martin Luther King Jr.
On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks, a respected member of Montgomery's black community, refused to surrender her bus seat to a white passenger when asked to do so.
King's interest in nonviolence became a central tenet of his leadership of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and helped lead a young generation of African Americans to promote desegregation through peaceful sit-ins.
Martin Luther King Jr. during Civil Rights Movement
She was arrested for violating a city segregation statute. -
Herman Talmadge
In 1956 Talmadge was elected to the U.S. Senate, where he served until his defeat in 1980. Talmadge, a Democrat, was governor at a time of political transition in the state, and he served in the Senate during a time of great political change in the nation as well. -
Social Security
In January 1957, following the successful bus boycott in Montgomery, Alabama (1955-56), a group of black ministers launched the Love, Law, and Liberation (or Triple L) Movement to desegregate Atlanta's city buses. Under the leadership of the Reverend William Holmes Borders, the ministers staged a violation of the state law requiring segregation on common carriers, thereby securing the grounds for a legal challenge to the very foundation of Georgia's Jim Crow architecture. -
Sibley Commission
In 1960 Governor Ernest Vandiver Jr., forced to decide between closing public schools or complying with a federal order to desegregate them, tapped state representative George Busbee to introduce legislation creating the General Assembly Committee on Schools. Commonly known as the Sibley Commission, the committee was charged with gathering state residents' sentiments regarding desegregation and reporting back to the governor. The report issued by the Sibley Commission laid the foundation. -
Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee
The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, or SNCC (pronounced "snick"), was one of the key organizations in the American civil rights movement of the 1960s. In Georgia SNCC concentrated its efforts in Albany and Atlanta. Emerging from the student-led sit-ins to protest segregated lunch counters in Greensboro, North Carolina, and Nashville, Tennessee, SNCC's strategy was much different from that of already established civil rights organizations in April 1960 . -
William B. Hartsfield
William B. Hartsfield was a man of humble origins who became one of the greatest mayors of Atlanta.
William B. Hartsfield served as mayor of Atlanta for six terms 1942-61, longer than any other person in the city's history. He is credited with developing Atlanta into an aviation powerhouse and with building its image as "e City Too Busy to Hate." William B. Hartsfield
He served as mayor for six terms (1937-41, 1942-61), longer than any other person in the city's history. Hartsfie -
Brown v. Board of Education
In 1936 the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) launched a legal campaign to compel the desegregation of southern colleges and universities. After years of litigation and incremental progress in Georgia, the organization earned a landmark victory in January 1961 when U.S. -
The Albany Movement
According to traditional accounts, the Albany Movement began in fall 1961 and ended in summer 1962. It was the first mass movement in the modern civil rights era to have as its goal the desegregation of an entire community, and it resulted in the jailing of more than 1,000 African Americans in Albany and surrounding rural counties. Martin Luther King Jr. was drawn into the movement in December 1961 -
County Unit System
The head of the state Democratic Party, and other officials on the grounds that Sanders's vote was worth less than that of Georgians who lived elsewhere. Judge Griffin Bell headed a judicial panel that ruled in April 1962 that the system was indeed invalid in its present form and must be redesigned before the next Democratic primary, which was scheduled for September. -
March on Washington
In August 1963 the civil rights movement staged its largest gathering ever, with as many as 250,000 participants at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, in Washington, D.C. Martin Luther King Jr. led the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom in August 1963. King's "I Have a Dream" speech was the most memorable event of the day and confirmed him as black America's most prominent spokesperson. -
Plessy v. Ferguson
Albany residents, for example, with the assistance of Martin Luther King Jr. and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, launched an ambitious, though ultimately unsuccessful, desegregation campaign, which came to be known as the Albany Movement. Meanwhile, black college students in Atlanta staged sit-ins to force the desegregation of area lunch counters. As a result of these and similar efforts throughout the state and region, the U.S. Congress passed the Civil Rights Act in 1964 and the -
Atlanta Falcons
In 1965 the Atlanta Falcons became the first professional football team in the city of Atlanta and the fifteenth National Football League (NFL) franchise in existence. Since the team's first preseason game against Philadelphia at Atlanta Stadium (later Atlanta–Fulton County Stadium), the Falcons have become a mainstay in Atlanta's sports culture. Now playing at the Georgia Dome, the Falcons join the Atlanta Braves and Atlanta Hawks as professional sporting attractions in Georgia. -
Atlanta Braves
After spending seventy-seven years in Boston, Massachusetts, and thirteen in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, the Braves moved to Atlanta to begin the 1966 major league baseball season. The move made the Atlanta Braves the first major league professional sports team to call the Deep South its home. Citizens of the city welcomed their new team with a downtown parade. On April 12, 1966, the Braves played their first regular season game in Atlanta Stadium before a sellout crowd -
Atlanta Hawks
The Hawks, a National Basketball Association (NBA) franchise and part of the Eastern Conference's Southeast Division, have called Atlanta home since 1968. Playing at Philips Arena in the heart of downtown Atlanta, the Hawks join the Braves and the Falcons as professional sports teams in Georgia. Former Hawks stars include Dominique Wilkins, Pete "Pistol Pete" Maravich, Mookie Blaylock, Dikembe Mutombo, Moses Malone, and legendary head coach Lenny Wilkens. -
Richard Russell
Serving in the U.S. Senate from 1933 until his death in 1971, Russell was one of that body's most respected members. Secretary of State Dean Rusk called him the most powerful and influential man in Washington, D.C., for a period of about twenty years, second only to the president. -
Civil Right Act
The civil rights movement in the American South was one of the most significant and successful social movements in the modern world. Black Georgians formed part of this southern movement for full civil rights and the wider national struggle for racial equality. From Atlanta to the most rural counties in Georgia's southwest Cotton Belt. -
Jimmy Carter in Georgia
The election of Plains native Jimmy Carter to the U.S. presidency in 1976 brought members of his immediate and extended family into the public eye. Carter is the oldest of four children born to Earl Carter and Lillian Gordy Carter, as well as the husband of Rosalynn Carter, with whom he has four children. Earl Carter James Earl Carter, called Earl, was born in 1894 in Calhoun County . -
Benjamin Mays
Perhaps best known as the longtime president of Morehouse College in Atlanta, Benjamin Mays was a distinguished African American minister, educator, scholar, and social activist. He was also a significant mentor to civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. and was among the most articulate and outspoken critics of segregation before the rise of the modern civil rights movemen -
1946 Governor's Race
The state of Georgia
Governor Joe Frank Harris (right) with historian Phinizy Spalding, who received a Governor's Award in the Humanities in 1990.
Phinizy Spalding and Joe Frank Harris
inaugurated the Governor's Awards in the Humanities in 1986. Through the initiative of Governor Joe Frank Harris, Georgia Humanities was designated as the convener and organizer of this annual event, which recognizes outstanding contributions to the humanities. Georgia's program is among the first of its kind in -
Lester Maddox
The tumultuous political and social change in Georgia during the 1960s yielded perhaps the state's most unlikely governor, Lester Maddox. Brought to office in 1966 by widespread dissatisfaction with desegregation, Maddox surprised many by serving as an able and unquestionably colorful chief executive. Early Years Born in Atlanta to a working-class family on September 30, 1915, Lester Garfield Maddox grew up knowing poverty. -
Maynard Jackson Elected
Elected mayor of Atlanta in 1973, Maynard Jackson was the first African American to serve as mayor of a major southern city. Jackson served eight years and then returned for a third term in 1990, following the mayorship of Andrew Young. As a result of affirmative action programs instituted by Jackson in his first two terms, the portion of city business going to minority firms rose dramatically. A lawyer in the securities field, Jackson remained a highly influential force in city politics. -
1996 Olympic Games
From July 19 until August 4, 1996, Atlanta hosted the Centennial Summer Olympic Games, an event that was without doubt the largest undertaking in the city's history. The goal of civic leaders was to promote Atlanta's image as an international city ready to play an important role in global commerce. Preparations for the Olympics took more than six years after the awarding of the bid to Atlanta and had an estimated economic impact on the city of at least $5.14 billion. -
1946 State Flag
On May 8, 2003, Governor Sonny Perdue signed legislation creating a new state flag for Georgia. The new banner became effective immediately, giving Georgia its third state flag in only twenty-seven months—a national record. -
Rural Electrification
In 2003, one-third of Georgia's schools were located in a rural setting. Rural schools are designated as such not only because they are situated outside of urban and suburban locations but also because many of them have cultural and social identities that strongly tie them to their communities, local histories, and residents' collective values. A rural school in a Georgia county or town. -
Agricultural Adjustment Act
Georgia has 9.6 million acres of land devoted to farms, with an average farm size of 228 acres. In 2012 Georgia's farmers sold more than $9.2 billion worth of agricultural products. Of the more than 42,000 individual Georgia farms in production in 2012 -
Mississippian
The Mississippian period in the mid- Western and South western united states , which lasted about A.D 800 to1600 saw the development of some of the most complex socetesthat evertisted in north america.