Stewart County GaArchives Photo Place.....Westville ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/ga/gafiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Christine Thacker http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00033.html#0008100 May 15, 2007, 1:34 pm Source: Sesquicentennial Supplement III (Columbus Ledger Enquirer) Photo can be seen at: http://www.usgwarchives.net/ga/stewart/photos/westvill12848gph.jpg Image file size: 92.7 Kb Westville: A New Town Made From OLd Parts By Joseph B. Mahan Executive Director of Westville Westville Village, 40 miles south of Columbus, is a Stewart County town and appears on the map as a neighbor to nearby Lumpkin and Richland.It is different from these towns, however, as it has no round-the-clock residents and there are no paved streets, utility poles or television aerials. There are also no window screens or snythetlc building material anywhere in the town. There are public buildings: a huge wooden county courthouse, a church, an academy and a campmeeting "tabernacle." There are old time commercial buildings including a general store, a cotton gin and press, a distillery and shops for working iron, leather, wood and clay. There are a dozen homesteads representing a range of style and affluence from the simplest one room logcabin to a two- storey six-columned town house complete with formal boxwood gardens and two gazebos. Except for one house built by a Yuchi Indian family prior to 1825, all these buildings were constructed between 1830 and 1855, the most distinctive and perhaps the most creative period in Georgia's history. It was the era when the state came into control of all the lands within its borders by the forced exodus of the Cherokee Indians in 1838 and its people set about building towns of the sort that Westville represents. In the style of its buildings, Westville is as typical of such towns of that era as Americus, Dawson, Cuthbert, Blakely, Oglethorpe and Columbus. Early citizens of any of these towns would find every building at Westville quite similar to ones with which they were already familiar in their hometown. Visitors from these neighboring towns would also feel at home inside the houses, shops and public buildings which make up Westville today. The furnishings, tools and machines used in all of these were actually put to the same use in similar buildings during the Westville period. Westville is not an old town, however; it is a town created during the past ten years from old, and rare,components. These buildings - as well as accoutrements - have been moved to their new location within Westville and restored to their original condition and appearance. At first such a town as Westville was merely an idea held by a few people who shared the realization that West Georgia was rapidiy losing all physical evidence of its historic past. This unhappy loss had long since occurred in the more populous and industrialized parts of the country. There was the realization also that very little of this past had been recorded for the future, either in photographs or written descriptions. Even if this had been done, such a record could not provide the degree of understanding that could be gained from seeing the original objects and the buildings as they were when actually in use. Many people expressed concern over this imminent loss, but little effort was made to save any of the threatened buildings or materials. The only exception to this resigned attitude was the successful effort by a group of Stewart County people to purchase and restore the magnificent Bedingfield Inn in Lumpkin. About the same time, 1966, an opportunity came to take an even more positive step in the way of historic preservation. Action on this had to be taken immediately or not at all and realization of this fact helped generate the required activity. The opportunity resulted from the offer by the trustees of the John Ward West Educational Foundation to sell the buildings and collections of the "Fair of 1850," a private folk-culture museum at Jonesboro. Ga. This museum had been created by Colonel West, a Georgia education and history professor and one-time president of North Georgia College at Dahlonega. Many of the rare items had been given to the colonel because he said they were worthy of being preserved in order that future generations would have the opportunity to see them. Others were offered to help pay tuition fees in the Depression years of the early 1930s. The same was true of the buildings he acquired to house his collection. Colonel West retired from North Georgia College in 1935 to Jonesboro where he had purchased land and had begun reconstructing the buildings to house his museum. Eventually, he was to complete several log houses and two shops, a cotton gin and press, a school house and the large, open-sided campmeeting arbor now at Westville. He personally bore all the expenses involved. For a quarter of a century until his death in 1961: Colonel West operated the museum and personally lectured visitors and demonstrated the techniques of such old-time crafts as blacksmithing, shoemaking, and operating such machines as grain threshers and cotton gins. He knew them all from personal experience in his boyhood and his ability as a story teller was equal to his ability to use antique tools. With him in charge, visitors had an informative and rewarding experience. In order to assure its continuation after his death. Colonel West willed the "Fair of 1850" to a private foundation he had established to be operated so that the income would provide scholarships and loans to needy students. Without its founder, the Museum proved impractical to operate and had been closed for several years when it was offered for sale in 1966. I learned of this action by the West Foundation Trustees and believed that the collection could serve as the nucleus for a more expansive outdoor museum somewhere in West Georgia. This museum also would incorporate some of the early buildings in the area which were in danger of being destroyed. There, they would be restored and shown performing the function for which they were originally built. As Colonel West had already stressed the year 1850, It seemed natural that the new museum should do likewise and in fact emphasize the year by showing the culture and the history of that one year. In other words, let it "always be 1850" in the museum which would be named Westville in honor of the truly pioneering work the colonel had done in cultural history. These plans were explained to the people in West Georgia whom I believed would be most interested in such a development and a non-profit corporation Westville Historic Handicrafts, Inc., - was formed on July 15, 1966, to acquire the West Collection and to develop a living history museum. This museum would preserve, research and teach the handicrafts and skills common to the people in the pre-industrial era, about 1850, according to the purpose stated in the organization's application for charter. Lumpkin seemed to be the location of a greater number of early buildings, utilitarian as well as residential and to be also central to the area to be represented at Westville. Thus, it was chosen as the location for the proposed museum and a suitabie site Was soon found along a creek near the southeast edge of the town. It was almost ideal in that it was in the shape of a bowl with the creek running through, the sides of the bowl would provide natural backdrops for the town and would serve to hide roads and otner modern construction outside the village. Fortunately, the site belonged to the Singer family of Lumpkin, members of which offered it as a gift to the corporation. The site covered 68 acres and contained the remains of a large millpond and the foundations for a grist mill and a sawmill, both of which had been in operation in 1850. The arrangements to purchase the "Fair of 1850" were completed in November, 1966 and much of the collection was bought to Lumpkin and stored until the buildings could be brought also. Plans for the proposed town were developed during the ensuing months. There were streets running north and south, crossed by others at right angles forming a grid of acre square blocks, a pattern commonly used surveying new towns about 1830 which was the year when the fictional Westville was "founded." The streets were named for Georgians prominent in the public life of that year. These inc1uded mostly governors and senators, except for Mirabeau B. Lamar, writer and poet and editor that year of the Columbus Enquirer, which he had founded two years before. The central block at Westville was designated "Courthouse Square" and left vacant in the hope that it would one day contain a courthouse. This was normal procedure among the promoters of new towns in the Andrew Jackson era, in the hope their town would become a seat of county government. The streets were surveyed and graded in the fall of '67 and the first buildings - the Faegin House and the McDonald House - were brought in early in 1968. The log houses and the Yellow Creek campmeeting arbor were brought from Jonesboro later that year. On Aug. 31, 1968, Governor Lester G. Maddox spoke from the portico of the unfinished McDonald House in ceremonies marking the"founding" of the new (but old) town of Westville. Although visitors were invited to the first annual "Fair of 1850," in November of '69, the museum was first opened to the public on April 1, 1970. From the beginning through 1976, work was continuous on the buildings which were being added very much as new buildings were added as the old towns grew. The landscape was developed around the entire town to have the appearance of earlier times. As they were completed, the buildings were furnished and activities typical of the Westville period were regularly conducted in them. The village had assumed the state of completion it now has, except for the Chattahoochee County courthouse on which restoration work is in progress at this present time. More than $2,000,000 has been expended in the development of Westville. Of this amount, some $800,000 have come from public funds, principally for, development grants from the Department of Health, Education and Welfare, the Labor Department and the Coastal Plains Regional Commission. An additional $900,000 has been from gifts of private persons and foundations in the form of antique furnishings, buildings and implements as well as cash donations and grants. The remaining $300,000 has been income Westville has earned through admission fees and sales of commodities, produced in the village, or acquired elsewhere for resale in the Westville store. The comment was heard often among the founders of Westville that "it will never be finished." In this they were basically correct. Even now most of the suitable buildings that can be found are in place. In 1978, the only large project that remains to be completed is the water power complex, the grist mill, sawmill and mill dam. There is much to be done in the building of reproduction outbuildings, digging of wells and developing of, yards and fields before the village will truly have the appearance of its prototype from a century and a quarter ago. It is hope that this can be a continuing development in the years to come. What remains to be done that is most important of all is to foster its purpose of becoming a great center for artists and craftsmen practicing their skills and passing them on to succeeding generations of student apprentices. If this is done, Westville will have accomplished its purpose. Special Sesquicentennial Supplement III Ledger- Enquirer, Sunday, April 30, 1978,pg S-8 File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/ga/stewart/photos/westvill12848gph.txt This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/gafiles/ File size: 12.2 Kb