Renee reports some very, very good news:
FamilySearch and the Georgia Archives announced today that Georgia’s death index from 1919 to 1927 can be accessed for free online. The online index is linked to digital images of the original death certificates. This free database will open doors to additional information for family historians and genealogists with Georgia ties. The index and images can be searched and viewed at www.GeorgiaArchives.org (Virtual Vault link) or labs.familysearch.org.
Greg Germani has been recreating old Atlanta-area photographs since 2003. He's even duplicated aerial photos! From a 2005 article:
He stands exactly where the original photographers once stood, and trains his 3.2 megapixel Nikon digital point-and-shoot in precisely the same direction. Today, he has taken more than 400 pictures that way. Pairing each photo with its antecedent, he posts them on his website, www.atlantatimemachine.com.
The pictures comprise a remarkable look at how much Atlanta has changed in the past half-century. The Atlanta Crackers' old outfield is now a Borders parking lot. An old gentleman's club is now a MARTA station. And downtown, which was once the entertainment and social center of the city, is now a ghost town on nights and weekends. [Link]
I've abstracted tons of deeds, but never one like this. The Athens (Ga.) Weekly Banner of August 12, 1890, reported that one William Jackson had conveyed ownership of an oak tree to itself.
William Jackson was reportedly a professor at the University of Georgia; the nature of his military service and the source of the title colonel is unknown. Jackson cherished childhood memories of the tree and, desiring to protect it, he deeded to the tree ownership of itself and the surrounding land. By various accounts this transaction took place between 1820 and 1832. According to the newspaper article, the deed read:
I, W. H. Jackson, of the county of Clarke, of the one part, and the oak tree… of the county of Clarke, of the other part: Witnesseth, That the said W. H. Jackson for and in consideration of the great affection which he bears said tree, and his great desire to see it protected has conveyed, and by these presents do convey unto the said oak tree entire possession of itself and of all land within eight feet of it on all sides.
The Crowley family graveyard in Decatur, Georgia, used to lie on a hill in the middle of a cow pasture. Now it lies high above a mall parking lot, surrounded by a two-story granite wall.
The surrounding pasture was graded to create the mall parking lot, leaving an elevated patch that contained the graves. The developer built a granite wall to protect them, and shut it in behind a wrought-iron gate that leads to stairs.
The result is a 20-foot tall, walled cemetery that resembles a bunker.
It bemused shoppers at Columbia Mall, then Avondale Mall, who sometimes called it "the tomb of the unknown shopper." [Link]
There's good news for the 488 Georgia communities wiped off the map last month. Complaints from small-town residents have caused the state's transportation department to change its mind.
"We're glad they've seen the light," said Dennis Holt, who led a campaign to have the name of Hickory Level, a town of fewer than 1,000 people in western Georgia, put back on the map. "It gets back to respect for rural areas. We just wish we didn't have to go to all this trouble."
Locals say the state's original decision to remove towns without their own post office or zip code from the maps was shortsighted because it overlooked their status as the backbone of the country. [Link]
Here is a list of the 488 small Georgia towns wiped off the state map. I'd be proud to have an ancestor from any of them, but my favorites are Poetry Tulip and Hopeulikit.
