|
|
Georgia Genealogy Trails "Where your Journey Begins" |
Bibb County History
|
|
Georgia Genealogy Trails "Where your Journey Begins" |
BIBB COUNTY.
Laid out in 1822; part taken from Twiggs in 1833; part from Jones in
1834. Lot 78 and fraction 79, in Old Baldwin, now Jones, added to Bibb,
1835. Organized in 1822, and named in honour of Dr. William W. Bibb.
Length, 19 miles ; breadth, 16 miles; area square miles, 304.
The Ocmulgee River is the chief stream. The creeks are Tobesofkee,
Rocky, Savage, Echaconnee, &c.
Macon, named after the Hon. Nathaniel Macon, is the seat of justice.
The first lots were sold in 1823. It is situated on both sides of the
Ocmulgee River, 32 miles from Milledgeville. The Municipal Government
consists of a Mayor and eight Aldermen, elected annually. There are
many handsome public buildings in Macon, namely, the Court-house, the
various churches, as, the Presbyterian, Episcopalian, Methodist,
Baptist, and Roman Catholic.
The Female College, standing upon an eminence, is constructed of brick,
160 feet by 60. The Southern Botanico Medical College is located at
Macon. The Legislature of 1852 appropriated $5,000 to enable the Board
to erect a building, procure apparatus, &c. One student from each
Congressional district in the State is to receive instruction free of
charge.
The Georgia Academy for the Blind is located in this city.
MACON COTTON FACTORY.
This establishment is situated in the southwestern part of Macon, on
the road leading to Columbus. Capital, we believe, $125,000. The
building is of brick, neatly constructed.
Vineville, one mile from Macon, is a pleasant retreat.
Messrs. Ingersoll and Ross erected the first framed building in Macon.
The first court was held on the 20th March, 1823, in a small log
building which stood near the depot of the Western and Macon Railroad.
Judge Shorter presided.
The first presentment was against a free man of colour, for retailing
liquor. The first indictment was stabbing.
Among the first settlers were Roland Bevins, Geo. B. Wardlaw, B.
Bullock, C. Baitman, John Douglass, James Henderson, Jonathan Wilder,
John Loving, Thompson Bird, Jeremy Stone, Thomas Howard, Leonard Sims,
Benjamin Mariner, Henry Bailey, Jeremiah Burnett, Anson Kimberly, John
Lamar, B. B. Lamar, Daniel Wadsworth, Jordon Witcher, Jeremiah Baugh,
Timothy Matthews, James W. Allston, A. Meriwether, J. Bates.
"Historical Collections
Of Georgia", by George White, 1855
Transcribed and Submitted by Brenda Wiesner
Bibb
County
was organized in 1822, being set off from Houston county, and
was named in honor of Dr. Wm. W. Bibb. A part 01 Twiggs county was
added to it in 1833 and a part of Jones in 1834. It is bounded by the
following counties: Jones and Monroe on the north and northwest, Jones
and Twiggs on the east, Houston on the south and Crawford on the west
and southwest It is watered by the Ocmulgee river and by Tobesofkee,
Echeconnee, Rock, Savage, Beaver Dam and "Walnut creeks. The Ocmulgee
river has fine water-powers, those at Park Shoals being estimated as
4,000 horse-powers, while the total unutilized powers near Macon are
11,070 horse-powers. This river is navigable to Macon for light draught
steamboats.
The red clay soil of the northern
part of the county belongs to the metamorphic and the gray, sandy land
of the southern section to the tertiary formation. A ridge of sand
hills runs diagonally through the county from northeast to southwest.
The lands along the Ocmulgee river are especially productive. Including
all kinds, the best and poorest, the average yield to the acre of the
various crops is: seed cotton, 600 to 800 pounds; corn, 12 bushels;
wheat, 15 bushels; oats, 25 bushels; barley, 40 bushels; rye, 13
bushels; crab-grass hay, 2,000 to 3,000 pounds; sugar-cane syrup, 100
to 300 gallons; field peas, 10 bushels; ground-peas, 25 bushels; sweet
and Irish potatoes, 100 to 200 bushels. Bermuda grass and clover do
well in the northern part of the county. On some of the lands 1,500
pounds of seed cotton are raised to the acre, and in other sections
from 900 to 1,200 pounds are easily produced. The river bottom lands
readily yield 60 bushels of corn to the acre. On some of these "bottom"
lands 7,000 pounds of Bermuda hay and 8,000 of German millet have been
cut to the acre.
The finest peaches, plums and pears
can be raised in this county.
All the varieties of vegetables do
well, and the truck sold in the county averages yearly between $35,000
and $40,000. The county raises 5,000 bushels of Irish potatoes, 66,000
bushels of sweet potatoes, and 1,000 pounds of upland rice.
There are 32,000 peach-trees, 4,600
apple-trees and of plum and peartrees about 2,000 each.
There are 25 dairy farms well stocked
with Jerseys and doing a thriving business.
About 20 per cent, of fertilizers
used is produced on the farms. Many farmers, especially those who have
dairies, have silo pits and use ensilage profitably. Bermuda grass
furnishes good summer pasturage, while clover, Texas blue-grass,
barley, rye, oats and wheat are used for winter pasturage.
More interest than formerly is being
taken in the improvement of beef cattle The timber products are small,
consisting mostly of oak, hickory, cherry, walnut, etc., in the
northern part. A little yellow pine is still left The principal game of
Bibb county is quail and doves.
he Ocmulgee river and the numerous
creeks furnish a considerable quantity of fish.
Among the minerals are pottery clay
(in abundance), some ochre, granite and limestone. There are two
granite quarries.
According to the United States census
of 1900 the county in 1899 produced 6,568 bales of upland cotton.
According to the census of 1890 there
were 343 sheep, with a woolclip of 834 pounds, 2,683 cattle, 1,137
milch-cows, 57 working oxen, 6,024 hogs, 27,124 poultry of all kinds,
482 horses and 1,324 mules. These statistics do not include live stock
in the city of Macon.
Among the farm products were 253,507
gallons of milk, 48,042 pounds of butter, 5,105 pounds of honey, and
41,192 dozens of eggs.
Macon, the county seat, named for
Honorable Nathaniel Macon, is appropriately called the "Central City,"
for it is very near, if not in the exact geographical center of
Georgia. In 1806 in what is now East Macon, was established an Indian
trading post and Fort Hawkins was erected at this western outpost of
civilization. Seventeen years later (1823) a town had grown up, most of
it on the west of the Ocmulgee, which was incorporated as the town of
Macon. The next year the first Macon academy was built Until the coming
of the railroad Macon's steamboat business was considerable. After the
city became a railroad center, steamboat navigation ceased, but in the
last few years has been resumed.
Macon is now a beautiful city with
well-paved streets, lighted by electricity, handsome public buildings,
elegant private residences, pretty parks, a first-class system of
water-works, an up-to-date electric plant system, two distinct lines of
electric railway with tracks permeating every section of the city and
its suburbs. The population in the corporate limits, according to the
United State census of 1900, is 23,272, in the suburban district of
Vineville, 7,787, and of East Macon, outside of the corporate limits,
5,078, making a total population of 36,137.
In the city and suburbs are 48
manufacturing establishments in active operation, having an aggregate
capital of $5,000,000, employing 4,500 operatives, paying out annually
in wages between $700,000 and $800,000 with an annual output of ten or
eleven million dollars. Among these leading manufacturing
establishments are: five cotton-mills for spinning yarns; three
knitting-mills, one for making stockings and socks and two for making
underwear; three iron foundries, for iron castings of every
description; brass and bronze machinery, repairing of engines and
machinery; three cotton compresses; three establishments for making
cornices; three cotton-gin manufactories; six cotton press
manufactories; two large cotton-oil companies, one of them having a
capital of $500,000, employing 400 people with a weekly pay-roll of
$1,000 and an annual output of between $2,000,000 and $3,000,000; the
other employing 100 hands with a weekly pay-roll of $700; a large
fertilizer factory with a capital of $145.000, a weekly pay-roll of
about $500, and an output worth $300,000. There are also large sash,
door and blind factories, a large candy and cracker factory and a large
and successful ice plant. There is also a barrel factory, one for
making pants and one for harness.
Counting every establishment engaged
in any kind of manufacturing there are 182 manufactories, with an
annual output worth $6,485,767. The Rutland Manufacturing Company
operates a grist-mill, gin and stave factory.
Macon's eight banks have an aggregate
capital, surplus and undivided profits of $2,063,500.
Among her commercial houses are some
of the most extensive in Georgia, reaching out for the trade of a very
large section of the State.
The fire department is unsurpassed in
efficiency.
The very best educational facilities
are afforded by a splendid system of public schools for city and
county, and by private schools and colleges. The public schools number
81 for whites and 18 for negroe?, with an average attendance of 3,296
white pupils and 2,200 colored. Mercer University for boys, Wesleyan
Female College, the oldest college for ladies in the United States, and
probably in the world, are firstclass institutions. St. Stanislaus
(formerly called Pio Nono), is a Roman Catholic college for priests,
and the Mount de Sales Academy is a school for girls under the auspices
of the Roman Catholic Church. There is also a Normal school for ladies
at the Alexander school building. The Ballard Normal School is for
colored pupils.
The Academy for the Blind is a State
institution with two departments, one for whites and one for colored,
under the same management and superintendence, but located on separate
lots in sections of the city remote from each other.
In Macon is the Appleton Home, an
orphan house under the auspices of the Episcopal Church, and in
Vineville and vicinity are two similar institutions, the Orphan Home of
the South Georgia Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and
Mumford's Industrial Home.
Other charitable institutions are the
City Hospital, on Pine Street, the Julia Parkman Jones Home for
indigent ladies, under the auspices of the Episcopal Church, the Roff
Home, with hospitals attached for the poor of Bibb county, The Home for
the Friendless, and the Door of Hope, a place of refuge for fallen
women who seek to be restored to a life of purity.
Through the Central of Georgia
Railroad Macon has connection with Atlanta on the north and with
Savannah and ocean transportation on the south; through the Southern
system with Brunswick and the ocean on the south and with Atlanta and
the cities of the north and west. The southwestern branch of the
Central of Georgia system gives direct communication with Columbus,
Americus, Albany, and all southwestern Georgia. The Macon and
Birmingham connecting with lines to the west gives a direct route to
Montgomery and New Orleans. The Georgia Southern and Florida, passing
through some of the richest sections of the State, connects Macon with
Tifton, Valdosta and the chief cities of Florida. The Macon and
Northern, another branch of the Central of Georgia system, connects it
with Athens; a branch of the Georgia Railroad connects with Augusta,
while the Macon and Dublin and its connecting roads gives still another
route to Savannah and the ocean.
The area of Bibb county is 254 square
miles or 162,560 acres. By the United States census of 1900 the
population is 50,473, an increase of 8,103 over that of 1890. According
to the report of the Commissioner of Education the school fund is
$30,369.34. By the report of the Comptroller-General for 1900 there
were returned for taxation as follows: acres of improved land, 151,093;
acres of wild land, 428; average value per acre of improved land,
$20.73; of wild land, $1.40; money invested in cotton factories,
$1,321,725; city and town property $6,889,190; money and solvent debts,
$834,433; merchandise, $1,162,890; gas and electric lights, $566,652;
building and loan, $105,000; household furniture, $652,335; value of
farm and other animals, $189,915; plantation and mechanical tools,
$69,480; watches, jewelry, etc., $76,810; stocks and bonds, $149,871;
shipping and tonnage, $2,505; real estate, $10,025,025; personal
estate, $6,402,661; aggregate value of property, $16,427,686.
Property returned by colored
taxpayers: number of acres of land, 4,084 valued at $387,345; city
property, $214,070; money, etc., $2,640; merchandise, $97,253;
household furniture, $41,080; farm and other animals, $25,290;
plantation and mechanical tools, $3,045; watches, jewelry, etc.,
$215.00; aggregate value of property, $683,990.
The tax returns for 1901 show a total
increase over 1900 of $339,764.
Macon
Knitting
Company $200,000 350
The
Macon Knitting Company manufactures seamless cotton hosiery, while the
Schofield Manufacturing Company makes men's ribbed underwear. The
Manchester Manufacturing Company also makes hosiery.
The McCaw Manufacturing Company, with
a capital of $500,000, makes cotton seed oil soap, and several
by-products from the manufacture of the oil, among which is
nitroglycerin.
The Central Ice Company has the
largest ice plant and cold storage ware-houses south of Cincinnati.
Population of Bibb county by sex and
color, according to the census of 1900: white males, 11,373; white
females, 11,705; total white, 23,078; colored males, 12,003; colored
females, 14,952; total colored, 27,395.
Population of Macon by sex and color:
white males, 5,771; white females, 5,940; total white, 11,711; colored
males, 4,886; colored females, 6,675; total colored, 11,561.
Total population in the corporate
limits of Macon, 23,272.
Domestic animals of Bibb county, kept
in barns and enclosures, not on farms or ranges, June 1, 1900: 111
calves, 15 steers, 4 bulls, 679 dairy cows, 1,105 horses, 301 mules, 5
donkeys, 2 sheep, 1,282 swine, 38 goats.
There are five cotton-mills, 3 iron
foundries, 3 cotton compresses, 3 cornice making establishments, 3
cotton-gin manufactories, 6 cotton press manufactories, 2 large
cotton-oil companies, 1 large fertilizer factory, 1 large candy and
cracker factory, 1 large ice plant, 1 barrel factory, 1 harness
factory, 1 pants factory, 3 large lumber mills, including sash, door
and blind factories, besides 4 flour and grist-mills on the Ocmulgee
and tributaries.
Source: Georgia Historical
and Industrial History By Obediah B.
Stevens, Robert F. Wright, Georgia. Dept. of Agriculture
TOWNS
AND VILLAGES OF BIBB COUNTY
Holton, a post-village of Bibb
county, is on the Southern railroad, about ten miles northwest of
Macon. It has express and
telegraph offices, some mercantile interests, etc., and in 1900
reported a
population of 47.
(Source: Georgia Sketches of Counties, Towns, Events, Institutions, and Persons, VOL II, by Candler & Evans, Publ. 1906.
Transcribed by Kim Mohler)
Lizella,
a village of Bibb county, is on the
Seaboard Air Line railway, not far from the Crawford county line. It has a money order postoffice, with rural
free delivery, an express office, some mercantile interests, and does
considerable shipping. The population in
1900 was 64.
(Source: Georgia Sketches of
Counties, Towns, Events, Institutions,
and Persons, VOL II, by Candler
& Evans, Publ. 1906. Transcribed by Joanne Morgan)
Lorane, a village in the northwestern part of Bibb county, is on
the
Central of Georgia railroad, has a money order postoffice, with rural
free
delivery, some mercantile interests and is a shipping point for that
section.
(Source: Georgia Sketches of
Counties, Towns, Events, Institutions,
and Persons, VOL II, by Candler
& Evans, Publ. 1906. Transcribed by Joanne Morgan)
Macon, sometimes
called the “Central City,” because it is located very near the
geographical
center of the state, is the county seat of Bibb county and the fourth
city of Georgia
in population. Shortly after Fort Hawkins
was built, in 1806, a Mr. Lyman, of Milledgeville, established a store
there
for the purpose of trading with the Indians.
This was the first house built outside the fort.
Other settlers soon came and in a few years
quite a village had grown up about the post.
The place was called Fort Hawkins up until 1821, when it took
the name of Newtown. When Bibb county was
created, in December
1822, commissioners were appointed to lay out the town of Macon,
reserving four acres for public
buildings. The first lots were sold in
March, 1823, and the town was incorporated the same year.
It was named for Hon. Nathaniel Macon, a
prominent statesman of North Carolina.
As first laid out it was all on the west side of the river, but in 1828
the Fort Hawkins
property was sold and the next year Newtown
became part of Macon. The first steamboat
arrived on Jan. 25, 1833,
towing two barges loaded with freight, having made the trip from Darien
in
eight days, a feat that was hailed with delight by the press and the
public,
though the distance is now covered in as many hours.
In 1900 Macon
had a population of 23,272 in the city proper, and including the
suburbs of East Macon and Vineville the population was 36,137. At that time there were forty-eight
manufacturing establishments, employing 4,500 people.
The manufactured products include cotton and
knit goods, yarns, hosiery, iron, brass and bronze work, brick,
machinery,
cotton gins and presses, cotton seed oil, fertilizers, sash, doors and
blinds,
ice, candy, crackers, and many others.
The city has nine railroads radiating in all directions, two
national
and six state banks, strong commercial houses that do a wholesale
business over
a large section of the state, good hotels, a fine fire department,
waterworks,
electric lights, a number of newspapers and periodicals, and an
efficient
street railway service. Besides the
public school system Macon
is the seat of several higher institutions of learning, notably the
Mercer
university, the Wesleyan female college, St. Stanislaus college, Mount
de Sales
academy, and the Ballard normal school for colored students. It is well supplied with churches and
charitable institutions, among which is the state Academy for the blind. On July 30, 1864, an attack was made upon the
city by General Stoneman, while that officer was on his famous raid,
and again
on Nov. 20th the place was threatened by Kilpatrick’s
cavalry, but
the city was saved both times by the timely interference of General
Wheeler. On April 20, 1865, Wilson’s
Federal cavalry
occupied the city without resistance, the war being already practically
at an
end.
(Source: Georgia Sketches of
Counties, Towns, Events, Institutions,
and Persons, VOL II, by Candler
& Evans, Publ. 1906. Transcribed by Joanne Morgan)
©Genealogy Trails