Historic Sites in Jackson County

The history of Jackson County

Jackson County was created in 1796 from part of Franklin County, on land formerly held by the Cherokee and Muscogee (Creek), and was named for James Jackson, a Revolutionary War general. Its size shrank as portions went to Clarke, Madison, Walton and Barrow counties. White settlers, many of them Revolutionary War veterans, began arriving in 1784. At Groaning Rock, William Dunson established a settlement with homes, a fort, a gristmill and an iron smelter; it later took the name Harmony Grove and became Commerce in 1904, a name reflecting its importance as a cotton market. The land first chosen for Franklin College, the forerunner of the University of Georgia, lay in Jackson County until it was transferred to Clarke County in 1801. Clarkesboro served as the county seat until 1802, and in 1803 the seat moved to Jefferson, a town previously known as Thomocoggan. In Jefferson on March 30, 1842, Dr. Crawford W. Long used sulfuric ether while removing a cyst from the neck of James Venable, a procedure considered the first surgery performed with anesthesia; the Crawford W. Long Museum stands on the site of his office. Railroads reached the county at Center and Maysville beginning in 1870. Governor Lamartine Hardman and novelist Olive Ann Burns are among the county's notable residents.

Sources: georgiaencyclopedia.orggeorgiahistory.comen.wikipedia.org