Q: What happened to Milton County? When did it cease to exist, and why?
A: The bulbous northern part of Fulton County looks like it could fall off its skinny neck at any minute because it didn't always belong to Fulton. That part was once called Milton County, which was created in 1857. Land from Cobb, Cherokee and Forsyth counties was used to form Milton, which became Georgia's 121st county and was named for John Milton, a Revolutionary War officer and Georgia's first secretary of state. The new county was paradise found, featuring rolling hills and an abundance of rich farm land, which was planted with cotton. Alpharetta soon became the county seat and agriculture remained the focus of the economy until the early 20th century, when boll weevils decimated the cotton crop, severely damaging the county's finances. In order to save money during the Great Depression, Milton County and Campbell County, which was southwest of Fulton, merged with Fulton in the early 1930s, creating a quite lengthy Fulton County.
Q: Other than Rosalynn Carter, were any other First Ladies born in Georgia?
A: The road to the White House started in Georgia for one other woman. The first First Lady to have been born in Georgia was Ellen Axson, who was born in Savannah in 1860, 25 years before she married Woodrow Wilson, who was elected president in 1912. Her father, Samuel Edward Axson, was a Presbyterian minister, who also served as a chaplain in the Confederate army, moved the family to Madison during the Civil War, and then to Rome when the war ended. Prior to the war, he had often preached at the First Presbyterian Church in Augusta, where Wilson's father, Joseph Ruggles Wilson, was the minister. It is said that is where Wilson and Ellen first met, when he was around 3 and she was a baby. Wilson was practicing law in Atlanta in 1883 when he visited the First Presbyterian Church in Rome, where he saw Ellen. He called on her family the next day and they were married two years later. The Wilsons moved to Pennsylvania and Ellen never lived in Georgia again. She became ill with what was called Bright's disease, a type of kidney disease, and died in 1914, just two years after Wilson was elected president. The next year, Wilson met Edith Gault, and she soon became his second wife.
What do you want to know about Georgia?
If you’re new in town or have questions about this special place we call home, ask us! E-mail Andy Johnston at q&a@ajc.com.
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