Georgia Genealogy Trails "Where your Journey Begins"

Oconee County, Georgia
History

Oconee County was laid out from Clarke and was named for the Oconee river, which forms its eastern boundary. It lies in the eastern part of the state and is bounded by Clarke county on the northeast, Oglethorpe on the east, Greene on the south, Morgan and Walton on the southwest, and Walton and Jackson on the northwest. The Oconee and Appalachee rivers, with their branches, water the county. The surface is hilly. The soil is productive and raises good crops of corn, wheat, oats, barley, sweet and Irish potatoes, cotton, ground and field peas, sugar-cane, vegetables, berries and melons. Peaches and apples yield abundantly and large quantities of fruits and vegetables are exported. Along the streams are growths of sycamore, poplar, maple, ash and gum. In other parts of the county grow oak, hickory, chestnut and walnut. There is also some pine, but the output of lumber is insignificant. There are a number of factories along the Oconee and Appalachee rivers, but the water-power is greatly in excess of what is used. The minerals are mica, feldspar, hornblende and gneiss. Watkinsville is the county seat. It is on the Macon & Athens branch of the Central of Georgia Railroad. A division of the Seaboard Air Line traverses the northern part of the county. The population in 1900 was 8,602, showing a gain in 889 in ten years.

Watkinsville, the county seat of Oconee county, was incorporated in 1806 and was long the county seat of Clarke county. At the organization of Oconee county it retained the court house with the same relation to the new county that it had formerly held to Clarke. It is located on the Macon & Northern branch of the Central of Georgia railway within a belt of red lands which run across the county from the upper portion of Clarke southward into Morgan county. It has a money order postoffice with rural free delivery, a bank, several commercial establishments, express and telegraph offices, schools and churches, etc. The population in 1900 was 351.