Historic Sites in Oglethorpe County

The history of Oglethorpe County

Oglethorpe County was created on December 19, 1793, from part of Wilkes County and named for James Edward Oglethorpe, who founded the colony of Georgia in 1733. Muscogee (Creek) and Cherokee people lived in the region until treaties signed in 1773 transferred the land to colonial Georgia. Among the first permanent white settlers were Virginia tobacco planters led by Revolutionary War veteran George Mathews, while North Carolinians settled Lexington, which was incorporated as the county seat in 1806. Cotton plantations built on enslaved labor followed, and after emancipation sharecropping kept agriculture at the center of county life. Oglethorpe was home to a remarkable number of early political figures, including William H. Crawford, a U.S. senator, and later governors George R. Gilmer and Wilson Lumpkin. The Georgia Railroad built through the county in 1839, spurring depot towns such as Crawford, first called Lexington Depot, and Stephens. Later enterprises included fertilizer plants, scuppernong vineyards near Maxeys, lumber, granite and textiles. Places a visitor can still see include the Romanesque Revival courthouse of 1887 in Lexington, the National Register-listed communities of Philomath and Smithonia, and the Watson Mill Bridge, an 1885 structure that is the longest original covered bridge in Georgia.

Sources: georgiaencyclopedia.orggeorgiahistory.com