Wyomia Tyus was born to run. The Griffin native became the first athlete to win gold medals in the 100-yard dash in consecutive Olympics. As a 15–year–old African–American competing in the state track championships, she caught the eye of coach Ed Temple of the legendary Tennessee State University Tigerbelles women’s track team. Two years later, […]
For 17 days in 1996, Atlanta was the center of the world. In 1990, the International Olympic Committee chose Atlanta for the site of the centennial Olympics over five other cities. The games were the brainchild of Atlanta attorney Billy Payne. He and Mayor Andrew Young were the prime architects of the winning bid. The […]
Georgia might have become a Spanish colony had it not been for the Battle of Bloody Marsh, fought on this day in 1742. The battle on St. Simon’s Island was part of a global clash of arms between two empires: England and Spain. The two nations were at odds over pirateering on the high seas […]
The colony he founded is now the largest of the United States east of the Mississippi. James Edward Oglethorpe was born in 1696 in London and was educated at Oxford. He gained valuable military experience in the Austrian army fighting the Turks. Oglethorpe chaired a parliamentary committee charged with prison reform. It inspired him and […]
It grew from a crop-dusting company based in the Mississippi River delta and became one of Georgia’s most famous corporate residents. Delta Air Lines began life in 1924 as a crop duster, based first in Macon and then Monroe, Louisiana. Collett Woolman bought the company in 1928 and renamed it Delta Air Service, with passenger […]
Georgia began as an idea, the brainchild of James Oglethorpe and several other Englishmen who wanted to establish a new British settlement between the Savannah and Altamaha Rivers, on land claimed by both South Carolina and Spain. The new colony needed official blessing, and Oglethorpe and his associates—who became the Georgia Trustees—petitioned the Privy Council, […]
The President was on Sea Island on this day 2004 for the annual Group of 8, or G-8 Summit. President George W. Bush welcomed the leaders of the world’s industrial democracies– Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, and the United Kingdom — as they met for three days to discuss a host of issues. The […]
Long before the “World’s Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party” in Jacksonville, Georgia has always kept an eye on Florida. Georgia founder James Oglethorpe built Fort Frederica and the surrounding town on St. Simons Island in 1736 to defend the three-year-old colony from the Spanish in Florida. The fort at the mouth of the Altamaha honored King […]
It was the first steamship in the world to cross the Atlantic. The steamship Savannah was built in 1818 in New York as a sailing packet but was converted to a steamship after a Savannah shipping firm committed to buy it for transatlantic service. The ship was a 320-ton hybrid, equipped with a steam engine, […]
One of the most popular preachers in England and America in the 18th century first arrived in Savannah on this day in 1738. George Whitefield was born in 1714 in England, and educated at Oxford, where he met John and Charles Wesley; together they were the first leaders of the Methodist movement. After the Wesleys […]
