For almost fifty years, Wessie Connell introduced generations of Grady County children to the power of knowledge. Without any formal education beyond high school, she created an award-winning library system in Cairo, Georgia, and was a leading advocate of free access to information for all people. Her desire to expose children and adults to the joy of reading led her to develop innovative ideas that are now standard in public libraries: children’s story time, summer reading clubs, book mobiles, and branch libraries.

On March 15, 1922, the “Light Cavalry Overture” was played to listeners on about 1,000 radio receivers in the Atlanta area. This was the first broadcast of the city’s first radio station, WSB. The call letters, which had been assigned that afternoon by the U.S. secretary of commerce, had formerly been used by a ship’s wireless. The station was owned by the Atlanta Journal. To beat rival station WGST in becoming the city’s first commercial operation, WSB used the 100-watt transmitter of amateur radio operator Gordon Hight in Rome, with the call letters standing for “Welcome South, Brother.

A four-year liberal arts college in the mountains of north Georgia, Young Harris College holds a higher profile in Georgia’s social and political history than its 700-student enrollment (as of 2010) might imply. Founded in a small town between the villages of Blairsville and Hiawassee in Towns County, the school was typical of denominational schools in Appalachia during its early years; hardscrabble and poor, these institutions were typically guided by preachers, the area’s most learned leaders.

The 1881 International Cotton Exposition buildings in Atlanta's Oglethorpe Park consisted of a central building and several wings. The central building was devoted to textile-manufacturing displays while the wings showcased other southern products, including sugar, rice, and tobacco. The New Georgia Encyclopedia does not hold the copyright for this media resource and can neither grant nor deny permission to republish or reproduce the image online or in print. Requests for permission to publish or reproduce the resource should be submitted to the Atlanta History Center.

The city of Atlanta hosted the Olympic Games during the summer of 1996. The games drew approximately 2 million visitors to Georgia, as 10,318 athletes from around the world gathered to compete in 26 types of sports. Photograph from Wikimedia, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Public Health Image Library The New Georgia Encyclopedia does not hold the copyright for this media resource and can neither grant nor deny permission to republish or reproduce the image online or in print.