Telfair County – Building a better South

Former Atlanta Journal editor Jim Wooten bought and restored the “Talmadge Mansion” of the late Gov. Gene Talmadge in rural Telfair County, Ga., a few years back, as Elliott Brack write recently in GwinnettForum.com:

“In today’s world, this residence looks much like a Southern 5-4-and-a-door, with two-story white columns, red brick, and set about 100 yards back from the highway in a grove of pine trees. But it wasn’t built in today’s world, but constructed 77 years ago when most people in Telfair County probably didn’t have running water in their homes, and many had to bring out the buckets when it rained because of leaks in the roof.”

Read more here.

Quickfacts about Telfair County.

Pedestrian, Lumber City, Ga. Photo by Brian Brown.

Vanishing South Georgia photographer Brian Brown offers this photo of a pedestrian walking down a Lumber City, Ga., street that has a medical clinic behind the bright red doors.

Lumber City has about 1,300 people, a third of whom live in poverty. It’s on the eastern tip of Telfair County, which as 16,349 people, according to the 2012 Census estimate. Just over 60 percent of residents are white. About 36 percent are black. About 13 percent of people consider themselves to be Hispanic or Latino. As with Lumber City, a third of the county’s population lives in poverty.

Quickfacts about Telfair County.

Tag: Telfair County

Talmadge Mansion, Telfair County, Ga.

Walking down the street, Lumber City, Ga.