74 Exciting & Interesting Facts and Trivia About Georgia
Georgia! It’s not just a country in the very far end of Eastern Europe, or a town in New Jersey or Vermont, or the first name of a very famous painter with her own museum in Santa Fe, New Mexico. It’s also one of the 50 nifty United States, and the latest in our series of covering each one — like Alabama and Delaware and Colorado and Florida and Idaho and Kentucky and Louisiana and Maine and Massachusetts and New York. There are millions and millions (if not billions and billions) of actual literal facts relating to the state of Georgia, and we’ve narrowed them all down to around 70 of what we think are the most interesting and important ones. For instance did you know the state of Georgia has been a state for over 230 years? It’s true! If you didn’t know that, then here are 70 other things no one has ever told you before.
What is the state of Georgia known for?
1. Georgia is affectionately known as the Peach State, with the annual Georgia Peach Festival hosting up to 10,000 visitors a year. The succulent and tasty stone fruit was designated as the official state fruit of Georgia in 1995. There are also dozens of streets in Atlanta with some variation of Peachtree Street and Peachtree Avenue, so the very word is basically ingrained into the state. Georgia has also often been referred to as the Empire State of the South.
2. Mountains! The Blue Ridge Mountains are in the northeast, with the Ridge-and-valley Appalachians in the northwest. Brasstown Bald is the highest point in Georgia at 4,784 feet above sea level, and the list of summits in Georgia is stuffed with very cool names like Hightower Bald, Dick’s Knob, Big John Dick Mountain, Screamer Mountain, Blood Mountain, Wolfpen Ridge, Coosa Bald, Three Sisters, Young Lick, and Slaughter Mountain.
3. Atlanta! Not only is Atlanta the capital of Georgia, it also has the biggest population of any city in the state with almost 500,000 people. In recent years, Atlanta has been the site of a burgeoning film scene, thanks in part to generous tax incentives and dependable year-round weather. It’s not quite Los Angeles, but it has been referred to as the Hollywood of the South, and many films have been shot here, including Marvel Studio flicks like Black Panther and Avengers: Infinity War.
4. Sports! Georgia has representation in many professional sports leagues. The Atlanta Braves play baseball in Cobb County, and the Atlanta Hawks have been in the NBA since 1949. The Atlanta Dream of the WNBA are also stationed in Georgia. The Atlanta Falcons began as an expansion team for the NFL in 1966 and have been playing home games at Mercedes-Benz Stadium since 2017. The Georgia Swarm are a National Lacrosse League team, and the Atlanta United have been competing in Major League Soccer since 2017. As of the 2022 season, the Atlanta Rhinos compete in the North American Rugby League.
5. College sports are also huge in Georgia. Twenty-eight schools in the state are part of the NCAA, including four Division I football teams: University of Georgia Bulldogs, Georgia Southern Eagles, Georgia State Panthers, and Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets.
6. The Civil Rights Movement. The “cradle” of the Civil Rights Movement was in Atlanta, Georgia, where the historically Black colleges, a strong network of Black-owned businesses, and the presence of Martin Luther King Jr., created the framework for a major organization center that would help reshape the country in ways that is still being felt many years later.
A brief history of early Georgia facts
7. The earliest known humans in the Georgia territory were the Clovis, dating back to the end of the Ice Age in the Paleoindian Period almost 13,000 years ago.
8. Famous explorer Hernando de Soto passed through the Chattahoochee River in 1540. He’s generally credited as the first European to visit Georgia.
9. Founded in 1732 by James Oglethorpe — a former member of the British Parliament and often recognized as basically Georgia’s first governor — the state was originally envisioned as a refuge for those who served in debt prisons in London because he believed they needed a support system once they left. However, it turned out none of the original settlers were actually former inmates from debtor’s prisons. Politicians were breaking promises 300 years ago!
10. Oglethorpe played a big role in shaping the state of Georgia, even defending it militarily, particularly from the Spanish in the Invasion of Georgia in 1742. This led to Spain recognizing the British ownership of Georgia in the Treaty of Madrid.
11. Georgia was named for King George II. Maybe someday you’ll be a tyrant despot who’ll have a state named after you, too!
12. With its large population — and also large population of enslaved Black people — the state of Georgia had a lot to do with the formation of the Confederacy. They were the fifth state to cede from the Union on January 19, 1861.
13. General William Tecumseh Sherman presided over the Battle of Atlanta in September 1864, taking over the city and helping to secure reelection for President Abraham Lincoln later that year. It is hard to imagine that the Battle of Atlanta was an actual event in the history of the United States.
14. Georgia was the last of the 13 original colonies to be established in 1732 — 50 years after Pennsylvania was the 12th colony established in 1681.
15. Georgia is the fourth state, after Delaware, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey. It voted to ratify the U.S. Constitution on January 2, 1788.
Official Georgia state symbols
16. Recently in April 2021, the humble pecan was made the official state nut of Georgia. Georgia happens to be the largest pecan-producing state, accounting for a third of the harvest in the United States that adds up to 88 million pounds.
17. The official state amphibian of Georgia is none other than the classic American green tree frog, declared as such in 2005. The very likable green frog has also been the state amphibian of Louisiana since 1993. Ribbet ribbet mfs.
18. Here is a picture of the Georgia state flag, which was adopted on May 8, 2003. It came in a period of time where the state of Georgia could not make up its mind about what kind of flag they wanted. The current iteration was Georgia’s third state flag within 27 months.
19. The brown thrasher is the official state bird of Georgia. It’s also the inspiration for the Atlanta Thrashers, the former NHL team that moved to Winnipeg in 2011 and became the Jets, much to the chagrin of hockey fans all over Georgia.
20. The official state song of Georgia is “Georgia on My Mind.” Originally recorded by Hoagy Carmichael in 1930, it was made much more famous a few decades later when Ray Charles released his version on his album The Genius Hits the Road (1960).
21. Georgia has had an official vegetable since 1990: the Vidalia sweet onion. It’s known as such because of how they were grown in the small town of Vidalia, Georgia. They’re such a big deal in the state that the legislature passed the Vidalia Onion Act of 1986 to trademark the name and limit production to certain counties in Georgia.
22. The honeybee was named the official state insect of Georgia in 1975. This is as good an opportunity as any to remind you that bees are fucking awesome and necessary and important.
23. The North Atlantic right whale have calving areas along the Georgia coastline and in 1985 it was declared the official marine mammal of Georgia.
24. The Cherokee Rose has been the official state flower for over a hundred years — since 1916. It is a very pretty flower. Here is a picture of it.
25. Chelsea Rathburn has been the official Poet Laureate of Georgia since 2019, taking the torch from Judson Mitcham. You should buy her book Still Life with Mother and Knife (2019) and support the arts.
26. The Tiger Swallowtail was made the official butterfly of the state of Georgia in 1988. It is a very pretty butterfly. Here is a picture of it.
27. There are not a lot of older living species that are native to Georgia than the gopher tortoise. Originating in North America like 60 million years ago, it was designated as the official state reptile of Georgia in 1989. Here is a picture of a gopher tortoise so you know what one looks like.
28. A trademark of Georgia nature, the live oak was declared as the official state tree of Georgia in 1937.
29. Shark teeth are as bad-ass and awesome as they are relatively common up and down the coastal plain of Georgia — even though some shark tooth fossils can be an astonishing 375,000,000 years old. In 1976, shark teeth were made the official state fossil of Georgia.
30. Georgia has an official dance and it’s none other than the square dance, the same one many an American child was forced to learn in gym class in public education schools all across the country. It also happens to be the official dance of Alabama, Arkansas, and Colorado, as well as Idaho, Illinois, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Mississippi, and Missouri. And Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, and Oregon, as well as Tennessee and Texas. And Utah. And Virginia. And also Washington state. It’s also the official folk dance of California, New Jersey, and South Carolina. Why can’t some states adopt breakdancing or swing dancing or ballet or at least the foxtrot.
Tourist attractions & places to visit in Georgia
31. The Southeastern Railway Museum in Duluth, Georgia was founded by the Atlanta Chapter of the National Railway Historical Society. If you are impressed by trains then maybe you’ll be impressed by the 90 pieces of rolling stock they have on exhibition. It’s also been the official transportation history museum of Georgia.
32. Since it opened in 1928, The Varsity in Atlanta has had the reputation of being the largest drive-in in the world. Taking up two whole city blocks and able to host up to 800 customers inside, the location is still serving its loyal customers chili dogs, onion rings, and cheeseburgers with homemade pimento.
33. The Georgia Museum of Art in Athens was made the official art museum of Georgia in 1982. Art history lovers will find lots to admire here, with works from heavyweights like Georgia O’Keeffe, Winslow Homer, and John Singer Sargent.
34. The Fantastic Pit — located within Ellison’s Cave in Walker County, Georgia — pretty much exactly lives up to its fantastic name. At 586 feet, it is the deepest cave drop in the continental United States.
35. The State Botanical Garden of Georgia at the University of Georgia has more than 300 lovely acres across 11 botanical and horticultural collections, like a shade garden of azaleas, magnolia, viburnum, redbud, and camellia, and a native flora garden with more than 300 species.
36. The Windsor Hotel in Americus, Georgia opened in 1892 and is basically a Best Western now. However, the Windsor Hotel is much different than other Best Westerns in that it is presumably haunted. The 100-room Victorian mansion is rumored to be bedeviled by the ghost of a little girl who was supposedly pushed down an elevator shaft.
37. The Atlanta Ballet was founded in 1929, and it’s as good a dance company as any you’ll find the United States. The first regional ballet company in the country, the Atlanta Ballet has covered the gamut of iconic dance stories in their performances for nearly a century.
38. The American Prohibition Museum in Savannah, Georgia is an impressive treasury of exhibits and memorabilia that addresses (and perhaps celebrates) how America dealt with the 1919 passing of the 18th Amendment that prohibited the sale and drinking of alcohol. The museum doubles as a bar that replicates the spirit of the speakeasy and with whiskey tasting classes, they are much cooler than your average museum.
39. The High Museum of Art is located in Midtown Atlanta, and half a million visitors a year visit its exhibitions. Found in 1905, the greatest hits in its collection include works by Claude Monet, Jean-Michel Basquiat, and Dorothea Lange.
40. Geologists, lapidarits, and other rock nerds will enjoy Rock City near downtown Chattanooga, Georgia. Even if you’re not particularly passionate about gems and minerals, you’ll still find a lot of beauty in the lush sights of blooming gardens and breathtaking rock formations. There is even a particular view where you can see as far as seven states at the same time.
41. The Georgia Aquarium is located in downtown Atlanta. Hosting more than 10 million gallons of water, the Georgia Aquarium is one of the biggest aquariums in the world. They have African penguins and African pancake tortoises and whale sharks and manta rays and beluga whales and blacktip reef sharks and bottlenose dolphins and moray eels and goliath groupers and lots of other cool shit.
More fun, weird & crazy facts about Georgia
42. Believe it or not, it is against the law to keep donkeys in a bathtub in the state of Georgia. Donkeys actually have slightly more rights in Arizona, where it is perfectly legal for them to stand in a bathtub, but not sleep.
43. Believe it or not again, it is actually totally illegal for chickens to cross the road in Quitman, Georgia. This is not a joke, nor is it the punchline to one.
44. Believe it or not, part three: there is a law in Atlanta prohibiting you from tying a giraffe to a telephone pole. You are also prohibited from tying a giraffe to a street lamp.
45. Wild horses can be found living in Cumberland Island, Georgia. Cumberland Island, incidentally, is one of Georgia’s 11 National Parks.
46. Hart County is the only county in Georgia that is named after a woman. Nancy Hart fought against the British during the Revolutionary War.
47. The American Institute of Parapsychology once declared Savannah, Georgia to be “America’s Most Haunted City.”
48. The voting age in the country used to be 21. In 1945, Georgia was the first state to lower the age to 18.
49. Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International (ATL) is one of the busiest airports in the world — at least the busiest in terms of passenger traffic. However, it’s not really one of the biggest airports. Not even in the top 10!
50. Atlanta was the site of the 1996 Summer Olympics. The nearby mountains and network of big colleges with venues and playing fields of almost 26 Olympic sports made the city a logistically ideal host in terms of necessary infrastructure.
51. Coca-Cola was invented in Atlanta in 1886 by Dr. John Pemberton. Bonus fun fact: The famous Coca-Cola formula actually contained cocaine until 1903!
52. The very first college in the world to grant degrees to women was Wesleyan College in Macon, Georgia in 1939.
Georgia topography & geography facts
53. There are a lot of geographical features of Georgia. In addition to the Blue Ridge Mountains in the northeast and the Ridge-and-valley Appalachians in the northwest, the Costal Plain is located in the south, with the Piedmont plateau in the center of Georgia. The Cumberland Plateau covers the northwestern corner of the state of Georgia. There’s also about 110 miles of coastline bordering the Atlantic Ocean.
54. At nearly 60,000 square miles, Georgia is biggest state east of the Mississippi River.
55. Atlanta is the fifth capital of Georgia, and has only been the capital of Georgia since 1868. The first four were Savannah (1777 to 1785), Augusta (1786-1789), Louisville (1789-1807), and Milledgeville (1807-1867).
56. Georgia borders five states: Florida, South Carolina, Alabama, Tennessee, and North Carolina.
57. Brasstown Bald is the highest point in Georgia — 4,783 feet above sea level. The lowest point is sea level, since it borders the Atlantic Ocean.
58. The largest state park in Georgia is the F.D. Roosevelt State Park at Pine Mountain, with just over 9,000 acres that can be seen on 40 miles of trails. It’s been called a backpacker’s haven.
59. There are about 537 cities in Georgia, spread across 13 congressional districts in 159 counties. Georgia has the second-most counties in the United States, after Texas (254).
60. Covering about 47 miles of riverbed, Lake Lanier is the largest lake in Georgia. The second largest lake is Lake Oconee.
61. The longest river in the state of Georgia is the Chattahoochee River, which is 436 miles. Other major rivers that run through Georgia include Savannah River, Etowah River, Altamaha River, and Towaliga River.
62. Georgia’s oldest known rocks are from the Precambrian Proterozoic Era — which was between one and 1.34 billion years ago.
63. The collection of native fauna in Georgia wouldn’t exactly make for a very exotic zoo. There are alligators and copperhead snakes, but you’ll mostly won’t find anything more exciting than white-tailed deer, trout, salamanders, and catfish.
64. If you’re looking for the geographic midpoint of Georgia, you’ll find it about 18 miles southeast of Macon in Twiggs County, Georgia.
Famous people from Georgia
65. What do Outkast, Ludacris, Killer Mike, Gucci Mane, Future, Cee Lo Green, Childish Gambino, and Waka Flocka all have in common? They’re all hip-hop stars that have called Atlanta, Georgia home.
66. Athens, Georgia ruled the rock-n-roll scene of the world for a time in the early/mid-1980s. The B-52s, Widespread Panic, Drivin’ and Cryin’, and Pylon were all crucial to the Athens culture — but not nearly as much as R.E.M., who are perhaps the biggest band in the history of American rock-n-roll.
Click on the green to buy Green by R.E.M.!
67. President Jimmy Carter was born on October 1, 1924 in the very very small town of Plains (population 640 – yes, that small!), where the future Nobel Peace Prize winner worked on his family’s peanut farm as a young man. The dude has spent almost 40 years working with Habitat for Humanity, founded The Carter Center with his wife Rosalynn, and is almost certainly a much better human being than almost all of us.
68. You may not know who Juliette Gordon Low is, but you’re probably pretty familiar with the Girl Scouts and their delicious cookies that come around once a year. Juliette — who founded the Girl Scouts in 1912 — was born in Savannah, Georgia in 1860. Her birthplace was officially listed as a National Historic Landmark in 1965, and many Girl Scouts treat visiting the home as a pilgrimage of sorts.
69. Julia Roberts (born in Smyrna), Kim Basinger (Athens), Holly Hunter (Conyers), and Dakota and Elle Fanning (both Conyers) are all big-time female actors who were born in Georgia.
70. Some heavyweights of popular music were born in Georgia, including Ray Charles (born in Albany), Otis Redding (Dawson), Little Richard (Macon), and Kanye West (Atlanta). Between the four of them, they’ve created some of the most memorable and unforgettable music of the last century.
71. Lil Nas X was born in Lithia Springs, Georgia in 1999. Oliver Hardy was born in Harlem, Georgia in 1892. Other than having entertained many millions of people, that may be the only thing these two performers have in common.
72. Jeff Daniels (Athens), Laurence Fishburne (Augusta), and Spike Lee (Atlanta) — artists who have made dozens of great movies between the three of them — were all born in the state of Georgia.
73. NBA superstar Hall-of Famer and New York Knick Walt Frazier was born in Atlanta. Negro League catcher Josh Gibson, on the short list for the greatest baseball player who ever lived, was born in Buena Vista, Georgia. Jackie Robinson was born in Cairo, Georgia.
74. Two major literary landmark novels were set in Georgia: Gone With the Wind and The Color Purple. Both of their authors were also born in Georgia. Margaret Mitchell was born in 1900 in Atlanta. Alice Walker was born in Eatonton, Georgia in 1944.
Cover Image Credit: Image by David Mark from Pixabay
*****This post contains affiliate links. If you use these links to buy something we may earn a commission. Thank you for reading!*****
