Dahlonega (Ga.) – the DLG B

In partnership with Special Collections & Archives at the University of North Georgia, the Digital Library of Georgia (DLG) has digitized school yearbooks dating from 1975 to 1995. This period covers the years leading up to the second name change for North Georgia College (which became North Georgia College & State University) and its growth from a college to a university.

This project contained approximately 4,700 pages in 20 bound volumes that document how (then-) North Georgia College (NGC) saw extensive growth during this time, thus demonstrating its high research value as a digitized collection.

Dr. John H. Owen (1922-2011), a lieutenant commander in the United States Navy, was named the twelfth president of North Georgia College (NGC) in 1970. During his tenure, the enrollment of North Georgia College (now the University of North Georgia) nearly tripled, thanks to having produced more course offerings and programs, having integrated the campus in 1967, and having enrolled women military cadets beginning in 1973.

NGC saw significant changes in the late 1960s and early 1970s. For example, in 1967, NGC integrated, and in 1973 women were included in the Corps of Cadets. The effects of these policy changes shaped campus culture from 1975 to 1995.

Dr. Owen stepped down as president in 1992, and the vice president for academic affairs, anatomist Delmas J. Allen was named president. Dr. Allen served as president from 1993 to 1996 and managed the school’s transition from a college to a university due to the changes in student body population and faculty/staff demographics that followed nearly two decades of growth for the school and the region.

The makeup of the student body, the increase in student organizations, the addition of inclusive multicultural groups, and the expansion of the faculty/staff of the college all reflect the more significant demographic shifts in Northeast Georgia, and thus the university. In addition, most students at NGC during this time were from Northeast Georgia. Because of this, the Cyclops collection also serves as an essential historical representation of the Northeast Georgia region.

Wendi D. Huguley, the University of North Georgia’s Director of Alumni Relations and Annual Giving, emphasizes the value that these digitized volumes have: “Our office frequently sends digital yearbook links to family members, alumni, reunion groups and University staff who contact us requesting materials picturing their loved ones, classmates, or former colleagues. The online access to these records provides ease of use for anyone who is searching for their memories.”

Special Collections & Digital Initiatives Librarian Allison Galloup welcomes questions about the digitization project and can be reached at Allison.Galloup@ung.edu

[View the entire collection online]

About the University of North Georgia. Special Collections & Archives, Dahlonega Campus (Dahlonega, Ga.)

The Special Collections and Archives serve as the institutional memory of the university and its predecessors, Gainesville State College, and North Georgia College and State University. In addition, the Special Collections and Archives seeks to collect, arrange, preserve and make accessible collections related to the history of Appalachia, Northeast Georgia, and the communities surrounding the university’s five campuses. You can find out more at ung.edu/libraries/sc-archives/index.php.

Selected images from the collection:

Title: Cyclops 1975, vol. 68, page 58

Description: Band Company, 1975.

URL: https://dlg.usg.edu/record/gnd_yearbooks_61

Image courtesy of University of North Georgia Special Collections & Archives

Photograph from the 1995 University of North Georgia Cyclops yearbook. It is a black-and white photograph of a group of female cheerleaders, in their uniforms, standing in an informal group portrait. — Cheerleaders, 1995.

Title: Cyclops, 1995, vol. 88, page 183

Description: Cheerleaders, 1995.

URL: https://dlg.usg.edu/record/gnd_yearbooks_81

Miners panning for gold in a sluice flume. From the "Thar's gold in them thar hills": Gold and Gold Mining in Georgia, 1830s-1940s Collection.

August 1, 1829 article from the Georgia Journal documenting the discovery of gold. From the Milledgeville Historic Newspaper Archive.

++++No one knows for sure when the nugget that initiated Georgia’s gold rush was found, but the existence of gold in Georgia was first documented in 1829. An article from the Georgia Journal (above) verifies that the veins of gold found in North and South Carolina stretch into north Georgia. It goes on to warn that the consequences of mining this gold would be significant, severe, and should even be prohibited.

However, these words could not stop the thousands of miners that inhabited a section of Hall County (now part of modern-day Lumpkin County), fueled by a thirst for gold. By the late 1830s, almost six thousand people had settled there, many of them in the county seat of Dahlonega. Pictured above are two men engaging in deposit mining (panning). Later, as more and more people settled and the gold rush was in full swing, hard-rock mining (which involved drilling directly into the gold veins) would become the favored method. These migrations were not without consequence: the arrival of these miners displaced thousands of Cherokees from the northern part of the state. Dubbed the “Great Intrusion,” this dismissal of native people preceded the Cherokee Removal, where four thousand Cherokees from southern states died as they were forced by Army troops to relocate to Oklahoma during the winter of 1838-1839.

Hydraulic mining. Image from promotional material given to potential investors in the Dahlonega Consolidated Gold Mining Company, 1899. From the From the "Thar's gold in them thar hills": Gold and Gold Mining in Georgia, 1830s-1940s Collection.

The gold rush died down in the 1840s, when the remaining hard-rock gold veins became more difficult and dangerous to mine. Miners could no longer expect to make a decent living deposit mining, and, beginning in 1849, many relocated to California to seek their fortune. However, some mining continued until the turn of the century, and mining companies such as the Dahlonega Consolidated Gold Mining Company would continue to seek community investment as they employed hydraulic mining techniques that their colleagues brought back from California.

Hydraulic mining proved to be less profitable than the mining companies promised, and they soon went out of business. Although financial hardships emptied the mines, gold mining in Georgia was not forgotten. Modern-day gold-related tourism remains a staple for the city of Dahlonega, which hosts an October festival marking the glory days of the miners, and the dome of the Georgia state capitol building in Atlanta is crowned with locally-mined gold. Though the gold rush lasted only fifty years, it made its mark on both Georgia history and in the imaginations of those who have ever dreamed of striking it rich in the north Georgia mountains.

The Dahlonega Consolidated Gold Mining Company, between 1899-1906. From the Vanishing Georgia Collection.

To find out more about the gold rush in Georgia, you can view the Digital Library of Georgia collections “Thar’s Gold in Them Thar Hills”: Gold and Gold Mining in Georgia, 1830s-1940s, the Milledgeville Historic Newspaper Archive, and the entry “Gold Rush” in the New Georgia Encyclopedia.

Additional images of gold and gold mining are available from the Vanishing Georgia collection, which can be viewed at the Digital Library of Georgia and at the Georgia Archives websites.

Tag: Dahlonega (Ga.)

Twenty more years of North Georgia College yearbooks now available freely online

The Georgia Gold Rush