Jackson County GaArchives History .....History of Harmony Grove-Commerce, Chapter 1 1949
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Joy Fisher http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00001.html#0000031 August 21, 2004, 1:49 am

CHAPTER I

LOCATION

   The town of Harmony Grove, now the City of Commerce, is located on an
elevated ridge in the eastern part of Jackson County, Georgia, about three miles
from the Banks County line and the same distance from the Madison County line.
The center of the town is the dividing water shed between the Oconee, Grove, and
Hudson Rivers. The present area is a mile wide and about three miles long. The
city is located on the Southern Railway eighteen miles north of Athens and
twenty-one miles south of Lula. The general topography in the southern part is
level, partly hilly, while the central and northern parts slope off on either
side to springs and streams. Still farther to the northwest, the land lies
gently rolling. The greatest altitude is a bit over moo feet in the . southern
section. Other parts of the town run generally about 950 to 980 feet altitude.
This greater elevation which slopes off to the streams on either side with their
many diversified hills lends unusual beauty to the scenery which is lavishly
bedecked with beautiful trees of varied hues and types of unlimited variety. The
virgin forest perhaps suggested the name of Harmony Grove.

   The city being on the dividing watershed, the soil is varied in its
character, running all the way from a sandy gray loam to a very stiff red type,
the former prevailing in the southern part of the town and the latter in the
central and western part. All this has a firm clay foundation lying in the
Piedmont Section just below the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains.

   The original location of Harmony Grove was of interest because it was on the
main road from the mountain counties to the markets of Athens, Washington, and
Augusta. This was a camping ground for the covered wagon caravans as they drove
their stock and produce to market. There were no streams to cross but springs
ample for their use. The noted cold sassafras tree was known to all mountain
wagoners which will be referred to in a later chapter.

   This tree stood near the railroad one-half mile below the depot at the curve
in the railroad track. This tree was more than two feet in diameter. The
location of the town was attractive because of its fine and temperate climate
with its groves and forest surroundings. The summer temperature averages three
to five degrees cooler than Athens, yet it is not so rigidly cold as the
mountains in the winter. These environments made it pleasant and beautiful for
situation.

   In this select spot in Northeast Georgia the author was born and reared and
has spent the entire years of his life in what we consider the choice section of
the Empire State of the South. Georgia was founded by the English under James
Oglethorpe and settled largely by the English and immigrants from Virginia and
the Carolinas, with some few coming from the northern states. This state was the
youngest of the thirteen colonies that obtained their independence from the
mother country in 1783. It has been the home of numerous statesmen of the
highest quality for the past 16o years, also of leaders and pioneers in the
realms of science, literature and religion. In the religious realm Baptists have
had a marvelous growth, numbering, at present in Georgia, some 1,200,000
members. The first settlements of this section were along the rivers and creeks.
This was in the period immediately following the Revolutionary War, from 1784 to
1800, as evidenced by original land grants from the United States Government.

   In this particular section of rolling hills, fertile valleys, flowing,
winding streams, limitless forests of oak, hickory, chesnut, pine, poplar,
maple, gum, elm, and every variety of verdant growth of trees and vegetation, in
this, the incomparable Piedmont section of our beloved state, the village of
Harmony Grove and our now bustling city of Commerce had its nativity.
The above is a picture of this portion of Georgia, with its unparalled,
delightful climate, at the close of the Revolutionary War when the Cherokee
Indians were receding from this section and passing into mountain countries,
leaving evidence of their habitat and hunting grounds in the form of flint arrow
heads and cooking utensils found in their burial mounds of stone, some of which
were found in this immediate vicinity.



Additional Comments:
From

HISTORY OF HARMONY GROVE - COMMERCE
JACKSON COUNTY, GEORGIA

BY
THOMAS COLQUITT HARDMAN
1810-1949


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