Forsyth County: Twentieth-Century Changes

Forsyth County enjoyed a routine agrarian lifestyle for most of the nineteenth century, witnessing little change to its landscape after the initial clearing of the lands once owned by Cherokee Indians. After the hardships of the Depression years, farming techniques and living conditions improved, the population grew, and Forsyth County began to claim a new identity. This evolution, from a sleepy farming community into a center of business and culture in North Georgia, is the subject of an engaging and often sentimental journey through Forsyth County over the past one hundred years. Older residents of the county will recall how farming families were propelled from hopeless poverty to reasonable living conditions with the advent of soil stewardship, and how financial gains were also made as the focus of local agriculture shifted from crops to chickens. Residents who once dreamed of new trucks, tractors, and automobiles could now own them, schools grew from small wooden structures to brick edifices with multiple classrooms, the old wooden bridges were replaced by iron bridges and later concrete spans, and erosion and flood control ended the destruction and inconvenience caused by swollen streams during the rainy season. The twentieth century brought a new quality of life to Forsyth County, and photographs depicting celebrations, parades, and other local events illuminate the community pride that continues to grow with each passing decade.