HISTORY / HERITAGE
Dahlonega was also the site of one of the nation’s first regional U.S. Mints – now Price Hall, the administration building for the University of North Georgia – easily recognizable, with its iconic gold steeple made of Dahlonega gold. Dahlonega is authentic and genuine, with a rich, rough-and-tumble history that dates to gold rush days and beyond. These days tourism – and especially the wine industry – is the new gold.
In Dawsonville, learn about moonshine running, backwoods racing and motorsports glory-the origins of NASCAR-at the Georgia Racing Hall of Fame and Dawsonville Moonshine Distillery.
Explore Roswell’s 640+ acre Historic District. Discover the South’s only Trilogy of Historic House Museums, hear the “Authentic Story of the American South” from docents at Barrington Hall, Bulloch Hall and Smith Plantation.
Stroll back to 19th century Alpharetta on a self-guided history walk with over 25 significant sites chronicling the town’s early days.
Add to this a walking tour of downtown Cumming – much of it on the National Register, plus historic town squares and districts and the ruins of an old mill town.
In Buckhead, visit the Atlanta History Center, home to the premier collection of American Civil War memorabilia and learn how Atlanta “won” the Centennial Olympics. Wander Buckhead’s estate-laden neighborhoods, the very same Tom Wolfe captures in his thinly-veiled Buckhead novel, A Man in Full. If walking a trail of historic markers sounds like an ideal way to spend a day, Buckhead has over 70.
Sandy Springs originated as stop for Native-Americans who frequented the natural springs there, and became a community as settlers moved into the area. At the original springs’ site, the Heritage Sandy Springs Museum shares the story of the community in the re-purposed 1860’s Williams-Payne farm house.