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The Colonial Era
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The Royal Charter signed For Georgia
England's King George II, for whom the colony was named, signed a charter establishing the colony and creating its governing board on July 7, 1732. -
English Colonists settled in Georgia
English colonists led by James Oglethorpe founded Savannah, Ga. Gen. James Edward Oglethorpe sailed up the Savannah River with 144 English men, women and children and in the name of King George II chartered the Georgia Crown Colony. -
Spanish Forces invade Georgia
A Spanish force invading Georgia ran headlong into the colony's British defenders. The colony of Georgia had been an issue of contention between Britain and Spain since its foundation in 1733. Spain claimed the territory for its own colony of Florida and disputed what was regarded as an illegal occupation by the British settlers. -
General Jame Oglethorpe departed from Georgia
Gen’l. James Oglethorpe of England departed Georgia following some small scandal. After the Florida invasion an unhappy officer in his regiment had made some serious allegations of misconduct against Oglethorpe, and the War Office in London wanted the general to answer those charges. Also, Oglethorpe needed Parliament to repay him for his substantial personal loans on Georgia's behalf. -
Alexander Hamilton was born
Alexander Hamilton Stephens (d.1883), Vice Pres (Confederacy), was born near Crawfordville, Georgia. Stephens, who served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1843 to 1859, was a delegate at the Montgomery meeting that formed a new union of the seceded states. He was elected vice president to Jefferson Davis on February 9, 1861. -
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The Antebellum Era
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Mathematician James Camak demarcated the border
Mathematician James Camak demarcated the border between Georgia and Tennessee. Due to a faulty sextant and bad astronomical charts he drew the line a mile south of the intended boundary, the 35th parallel. -
The first steam-propelled vessel
The first steam-propelled vessel to attempt a trans-Atlantic crossing, the Savannah, departed from Savannah, Ga., May 26 and arrived in Liverpool, England, The paddle-wheel steamship Savannah arrives in Liverpool, England, after a voyage of 27 days and 11 hours--the first steamship to successfully cross the Atlanta. In Savannah Chatham Artillery Punch was served to Pres. James Monroe. -
Creek Indian Treaty Signed
Creek Indian treaty signed. Tribal chiefs agreed to turn over all their land in Georgia to the government and migrate west by Sept 1, 1826. This treaty provided for the cession of virtually all Creek land remaining in the state of Georgia in exchange for a payment of $200,000. -
The Southern Baptist Convention was founded
The Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) was founded. The SBC became a separate denomination in Augusta, Georgia, following a regional split with northern Baptists over the issues of slavery. Baptists in the Southern United States who split with northern Baptists over the issue of slavery, specifically whether Southern slave owners could serve as missionaries -
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The Civil War Era
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The seize of US Ft. Pulaski and Ft. Jackson.
US Ft. Pulaski & Ft. Jackson, Savannah, were seized by Georgia. The fort's surrender strategically closed Savannah as a port. The Union extended its blockade and aids to navigation down the Atlantic coast, then redeployed most of its 10,000 troops. The Confederate army-navy defense blocked Federal advance for over three months, secured the city, and prevented any subsequent Union advance from seaward during the war. -
Unions forces began with bombardment
Apr 10, Union forces began the bombardment of Fort Pulaski in Georgia along the Tybee River. Apr 11, Rebels surrendered Ft Pulaski, Georgia. Apr 12, Union volunteers from Ohio, led by Lt. James J. Andrews, stole a Confederate train near Marietta, Ga. They were caught 89 miles up the track. 8 of the 24 raiders were hanged that summer. -
The scrimmages between Union versus Confederate
Four Union gunboats destroyed the CSS Nashville near Fort McAllister, Ga. Popular during the Crimean War, the floating battery was revived by hard-pressed Confederates because the popular gunboats were not capable of doing the things that the batteries could do. -
General William T Sherman March to the Sea
The March to the Sea lasted nearly over a month from November 15th to December 21th of 1864 moving from to Atlanta to Savannah with 60,000 troops. (Bailey) It was his intention to cut the roots of confederacy with every man, woman, child, and any opposing force of the Union. As they march, the battalion of Unionist would steal food, burn down houses, and sometimes kill people. -
Georgia Readmitted to the Union
Georgia’s inability to get readmitted into the Union (1865-1871) was primarily because Georgia’s leaders would not comply to the Constitutional laws of United States. It was with Federal influence that Georgia was forced conform to abolishing slavery, limiting the governor to two successive terms, defining who could vote and electing officials within Georgia’s constitution. (Meyers) This document originated from the first draft of Georgia’s Constitution, now with notable changes. -
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The Reconstruction Era
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Amos G. Rhodes opened his first retail furniture store in Atlanta, Ga.
Amos Giles Rhodes was born in 1850 in Henderson, Kentucky. In 1875, he came to Atlanta as a laborer for the L & N Railroad. In 1879, he began a small furniture company in Atlanta. Some sources credit him with inventing the installment plan for buying furniture. In 1889, Rhodes entered a partnership with the owner of a neighboring furniture store J.J. Haverty (who would later found Havertys), forming the Rhodes-Haverty Furniture Company. -
The state capital was moved from Milledgeville.
The state capital was moved from Milledgeville, originally designed to be the state capital, to Atlanta. A constitutional convention met in Atlanta in 1877, and the question of Georgia's capital was put before the body. Speeches were made across the state, with Milledgeville supporters associating Atlanta with the abuses of Reconstruction and arguing that the temptations of the big city were too great for members of the legislature -
Alexander Hamilton Stephens was elected governor of Georgia
Alexander Hamilton Stephens truly believed that the white race was superior to the “negro” according the the corner stone speech. He stated that this was a natural and normal condition and that it is to be part of the Government for all to abide by and witness. The thoughts of Hamilton helped to solidify the heinous treatment of the black race and reduced them to cattle. -
The 1st state anti-lynching statute was approved in Georgia.
Georgia became the first state in the nation to pass an anti-lynching law, in 1893, but no white man was ever convicted in the United States of lynching a black man. After the law was passed, the lynchings still took place. It just was not a public display. -
Mar 18, Some 200 blacks left Savannah, Ga., for Liberia.
On this date in 1895, 200 former African slaves left Savannah, Georgia for Liberia. Much of the aid for this came through the American Colonization Society (ACS).The society also committed itself to fostering a public-school system in Liberia, promoting more frequent ships between the U.S. and Liberia, collecting and circulating more reliable information about Liberia, and enabling Liberia to depend more on itself. -
The lynching of Sam Hose
There were thousands of people that showed up to watch the lynching of Sam Hose. It was said that he threw an ax at his “white” boss, killing him. Cranford pulled a gun out on him and threatened to end his life over a money dispute. Hose was also accused of rape. There was no trial for hose. He was hanged immediately when he was attacked by the lynch mob. -
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The Jim Crow Era
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Farmers in Georgia burned two million bales of cotton to prop up falling prices.
To begin King Cotton diplomacy, some 2.5 million bales of cotton were burned in the South to create a cotton shortage. Indeed, the number of southern cotton bales exported to Europe dropped from 3 million bales in 1860 to mere thousands. The South, however, had made a pivotal miscalculation. Southern states had exported bumper crops throughout the late 1850s and in 1860, and as a result, Great Britain had a surplus of cotton -
Alonzo Herndon, former slave, purchased 2 black benevolent associations for $140.00 and created Atlanta mutual, that sold burial insurance.
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. -
The Atlanta Race Riots- Killing 10 blacks and 2 whites
The race riots of Atlanta Georgia were triggered by the influx of black competition for jobs in the area. The negro population had quadrupled from 9000 black in 1890 to 35,000 blacks in 1900. The europeans did not feel safe. The fuel that gave them reason to start a massacre was the white women. They would say that the women and children weren't safe and the negroes needed to be killed. This led to the expansion of the Jim Crow Laws. -
Nearly all white electorate voted by a 2 to 1 margin to abolish its system of peonage as of March 1909
Peonage is another form of slavery. Simply put “prisoners are contracted out for little to no monetary gain”. The abolishment of peonage was passed in 1867, but somehow it was in effect for long after, even today. The correlation is that the workers were approved rights as workers and the prisoners were being freed from doing labor that is involuntary. -
White firemen on Georgia RR struck to protest the hiring of blacks.
The 1909 railroad strike in Georgia, in which railway unions struck to insist on the removal of African American workers from more desirable operating positions, provides one of many such examples. The racial violence that ensued included the murder of African American workers, but the governor of the state refused to intervene, instead expressing support for the aims of the strikers. The white women's movement had started a strike as well. -
Leo Frank was lynched in Cobb County Convicted of killing Mary Phagan.
Mary Phagan was found in the basement of the building where she worked. Frank was said to be the last person to see the girl. He was hanged by a mob and after the trial, the KKK was established. Later, they found out that he was not the murderer. The lynching of the Richmond Brothers were conducted without a thought of due process like all of the lynchings that were tolerated. -
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The Civil Rights Era
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Eugene Bullard was the first black combat aviator.
Bullard was the first black aviator born in Columbus, Georgia. He was not allowed to fly in the US because of the hatred of the black man. He was a pilot in the French military. Bullard came to the US to enlist in the air force but was turned away. He then returned to the French military for a position and was later discharged in 1919. The NAACP held a March for equal rights and equality. -
Marcus Garvey entered prison
Marcus Garvey was known for uniting the black race. He had an organization called UNIA (Universal Negro Improvement Association) that united the world of negros”. The paper that he established was international. The people in Africa were aware of what was going on in the states. He was later arrested for mail fraud and spent two years in prison. -
The teaching of evolution was banned in public schools
In 1926 the Atlanta Board of Education placed a ban on teaching the theory in its schools, though it reversed itself soon thereafter in response to a threatened legal challenge. Antievolution rhetoric remained strong, and some of Georgia's leading citizens issued uncompromising denunciations of the Darwinian theory. John Scopes was convicted of teaching about evolution in the same year. -
Martin King was born and won the nobel peace prize in 1964.
In 1955 the civil rights movement began. The Civil Rights Movement was at a peak from 1955-1965. Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965, guaranteeing basic civil rights for all Americans, regardless of race, after nearly a decade of nonviolent protests and marches, ranging from the 1955-1956 Montgomery bus boycott to the student-led sit-ins of the 1960s to the huge March on Washington in 1963.