| Located in the southeastern U.S., Georgia was the last of the original Thirteen Colonies to be founded. It is bordered by North and South Carolina, Florida, Alabama, Tennessee, and the Atlantic Ocean to the East. Area, 58,876 sq mi (152,489 sq km).
Pop, (2000) 8,186,453, an 26.4% increase since the 1990 census.
Capital and largest city, Atlanta.
Nickname, Empire State of the South.
Motto, Wisdom, Justice, and Moderation.
State bird, brown thrasher.
State flower, Cherokee rose.
State tree, live oak.  Although the trade and service sectors supply the majority of jobs in Georgia, manufacturing and agriculture remain important to the state's economy. In addition, federal facilities, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, near Atlanta; Fort Benning, near Columbus; and the Kings Bay naval base, contribute to the economy.
Cotton, once Georgia's most valuable crop, has declined in importance; in the 1990s it was rivaled by peanuts, tobacco, and corn. Georgia is easily the nation's largest producer of peanuts. Tobacco is the principal crop in the central and southern sections of the state, peanuts in the southwest. Livestock and poultry raising account for the largest share of farm income; broilers, eggs, and cattle are major products.
The manufacture of textiles and textile products has long been Georgia's leading industry, centering mainly around Columbus, Augusta, Macon, and Rome. Other major manufactures include transportation equipment, foods, paper products, and chemicals. Automobile manufacturing is important around Atlanta. Much of Georgia is heavily forested with pine, and the state is a leading producer of lumber and pulpwood. Although the state is rich in minerals, mining is not as important as manufacturing and agriculture. The most valuable minerals produced are clays, stone, kaolin, iron ore, sand, and gravel. Georgia is famous for its fine marble. Georgia's capital city, Atlanta, is a first class international city. The city and its surrounding counties offer affordable housing, substantial employment opportunities, major league sports teams, public and private golf courses, arts and cultural facilities and programs, and museums. Atlanta has a well-developed public transportation system, Marta, utilizing rail and bus services, and Atlanta Hartsville-Jackson International airport, consistently the busiest airport in the world. For that reason alone, many Fortune 500 companies have established operations and regional or national headquarters here, including Coca Cola, United Parcel Service (UPS), Genuine Parts, Kimberly-Clark Corporation, Siemens, MCI, Philips, BellSouth, AT&T, Newell Rubbermaid, AGCO, Rock-Tenn, Turner Entertainment, the Weather Channel, Lockheed Martin Corp., Cable News Network (CNN), the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), Home Depot, Delta Airlines, Scientific Atlanta, Sun Trust Bank, Nortel Networks, Lucent Technologies, NCR Corporation, ADP, Southern Company, Georgia Power, Earthlink, WestPoint Stevens, Georgia Pacific, McKesson Industries, Panasonic and Ryder Truck. Atlanta is also a major educational center, with many prestigious colleges and universities, including Emory University, Georgia State University, and Georgia Institute of Technology (Georgia Tech), which U.S. News & World Report consistently lists as among the 50 best universities in the nation. In Atlanta, sports verges on religion, with the hundreds of thousands of fans of the Atlanta Braves, the Atlanta Hawks, the Atlanta Falcons, the Atlanta Thrashers, Atlanta International Raceway, Atlanta Motor Speedway, the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets, and the nearby University of Georgia Bulldogs. And, Atlanta wash host city to the 1996 Centennial Olympic Summer Games. Georgia is also famous for its association with the music industry through its recording  businesses and the significant number of majo musical artists who are Georgia natives or who make Georgia their home. They include the Allman Brothers Band, Chet Atkins, the Atlanta Rhythym Section, Toni Braxton, James Brown, T. Graham Brown, Peabo Bryson, Ray Charles, Terri Gibbs, Amy Grant, Issac Hayes, the Indigo Girls, Alan Jackson, Sir Elton John, Gladys Knight, Brenda Lee, Johnny Mercer, Ronnie Milsap, "Piano Red" Perryman, Otis redding, Jerry Reed, REM, Little Richard, Tommy Roe, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Joe South, Ray Stevens, The Tams, Travis Tritt, Trisha Yearwood, and many, many more.
*Information from Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition |