Nickname: Peach State
Date Ratified: January 2, 1788 (4th)
Capital: Atlanta

Map of Georgia

• In terms of land area, Georgia is the largest state east of the Mississippi River. When taking into account water area, though, Georgia is 4th largest behind Michigan, Wisconsin, and Florida.
• The first Gold Rush in the history of the United States took place in 1829 when gold was discovered in the mountains of north Georgia.
• The first Girl Scout troop meeting was in Savannah in 1912.
• The state song is “Georgia on my Mind” by Hoagy Carmichael. The song was originally written about a woman named Georgia, but the state legislature voted to make it the state song in 1979, after hearing Ray Charles sing it. In a move that many see as symbolic considering the state’s segregationist past, Ray Charles was invited to sing the song on the legislative floor when the bill was passed.
• The University of Georgia, established in 1785, was the first state-chartered school in the U.S.
• Fort Benning, where I went to Basic Training (a story for another time), is the largest infantry training center in the world.
• Stone Mountain, near Atlanta, is the world’s largest bas-relief sculpture in the world, and depicts Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee, and Stonewall Jackson riding their horses. The original sculptor, Gutzon Borglum, began work on the sculpture in 1923, but would quit in 1925 over differences of opinion with the project’s sponsors, which included the Ku Klux Klan and the United Daughters of the Confederacy. Borglum would go on to create Mt. Rushmore, where he would use many of the techniques that he learned at Stone Mountain. Another sculptor, Augustus Lukeman, took over where Borglum left off, but he ceased working on the sculpture in 1928. Stone Mountain remained incomplete for 30 years before the state legislature eventually purchased the site of the sculpture, and it was finally completed in 1972.
• The current state flag of Georgia was adopted in 2003. Prior to that, the Georgia state flag incorporated the Confederate Battle Flag into its design, which was considered controversial and offensive. The current state flag, however, intentionally incorporates elements of the first Confederate National Flag. Though less recognizable than the Confederate Battle Flag, it still commemorates Georgia’s history as part of the Confederacy, so what was the point in changing it?

Flag of Georgia

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