Linda Tanner, Chairperson of Commission 86 Main St South Pearson, Ga.31642 912-422-3391
Atkinson County, Georgia's 153rd county, covers an area of 338 square miles and was carved from portions of Clinch and Coffee Counties by the state legislature in 1917. The south central Georgia county was named for William Y. Atkinson, speaker of the state House of Representatives and Georgia's Governor in the late 1880s.
The region was originally inhabited by Creek Indians, who forged a trail through the southern part of the area that was later used by traders between the Flint River and the coastal town of St. Marys. This trail was known as the Kinnaird Trail for a trading post managed by Jack Kinnaird at its western limit. It was along the Kinnaird Trail that the first white settlers traveled from middle Georgia, Tennessee, and North Carolina, arriving after the Revolutionary War. The Brunswick and Albany Railroad laid its track along portions of the trail after the Civil War, reaching Pearson, named in honor of Benjah Pearson (1811-1885), the county seat, by the 1870s.
Pearson was incorporated in December 1890, and the county courthouse was built there in 1920. The courthouse was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1980. Other towns in the county are Axson, Kirkland, and Willacoochee. Axson, called McDonald's Mill before the creation of Atkinson County, was renamed in honor of U.S. president Woodrow Wilson's first wife, Ellen Louise Axson, when the new county was created. Willacoochee, an Indian name believed to mean "home of the wildcat," founded in 1889, was the first chartered town in the county. The town has one building, McCranie's Turpentine Still, listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The still was active in Willacoochee from 1925 to 1949.
Early industry in Atkinson County depended on the pine forests covering much of the land. Logging operations used the Satilla River to float timber to the coast. Later, farming (tobacco, corn, and poultry) displaced logging as the central economic activity, and more than half of the employment in Atkinson County now comes from the manufacturing sector, followed by service jobs and retailing. Poultry continues to be an important industry, and the main agricultural crops are peanuts, cotton, corn, and tobacco.
According to the 2000 U.S. census, the county population was 7,609. The population showed a 22.5 percent increase between 1990 and 2000, largely because of the number of Hispanics who moved into the county to work in the mobile home industry and in agriculture.
Among the points of interest are the Columbus Salt Road, the Kinnaird Trail, the Alapaha River, McCranie's Turpentine Still, Guest Mill Pond, Kirkland Mill Pond, the Round-a-bout Swamp, abundant wildlife, early 1900s era homes along Willacoochee's Main St, and the Minnie F. Corbitt Memorial Museum, established in 1955 and located in the first house in Pearson, built in 1873. It is dedicated to the memory of South Georgia pioneers and their way of life. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, Pearson was known as the "Chess Capital" of the state. The town hosted four consecutive champonships, and Pearson residents made up one-fourth of the membership of the Georgia Chess Association.
Atkinson County is transportation blessed. Pearson is located at the intersection of two major 4 lane highways, US 82 and US 441. We have two railheads. The St. Marys West Railway in Pearson leads East into CSX's Rice Yard in Waycross, Ga. The railway in Willacoochee, owned by Georgia Department of Transportation leads South toward Valdosta, Ga and connects to Norfolk Southern. We also have the Douglas Municipal Airport 15 minutes drive North of Pearson and Willacoochee.
LINKS
Atkinson County School System City of Pearson City of Willacoochee Georgia State Government Local Weather
Southeast Georgia Regional Development Center
For questions or suggestions about this site contact- David Moore D.Moore@Atkinson-Ga.org