31 January 1861: Julia A. Flisch, Author and Women's Education Advocate, Is Born

On this day in 1861, Julia Anna Flisch was born to Pauline and Leonard Flisch in Augusta, Georgia. While Julia was still an infant, her family moved to Athens, where her parents, German immigrants, ran a sweets shop across the street from the University of Georgia, selling cakes and ice cream to college students. Julia grew up in Athens; her family lived above their store, and were active in the community, including the First Presbyterian Church, where her father was an Elder. She later noted that "the history and traditions of my childhood were the history and traditions of the University of Georgia."


After graduating with honors from the Lucy Cobb Institute in in 1877, Julia wanted to attend UGA, but her application was rejected because she was female. Her family returned to Augusta  a few years later (according to Augustus Longstreet Hull, college boys who bought on credit and never paid made the business unprofitable, and the move was "self defense"). 


In 1882, she wrote a letter to the Augusta Chronicle titled "Give the Girls a Chance," calling for more educational and occupational opportunities for women in the South to "work out their own sense of independence" and "to be of some active use in the world." She signed the letter only, "A Young Woman." The subject stirred the Augusta population, and two weeks later, the paper published that Julia Flisch was the author. 


Over the next few years, she wrote frequently on the subject of women's education, and criticized the common education provided to girls at the time--with a focus on sewing, music, and decorative arts--as "defective education" that denied women the ability to properly support themselves.


Julia herself went to Coopers Union in New York to study secretarial skills, such as shorthand and typewriting in 1883 and 1884. She returned to Augusta and worked as a bookkeeper while writing and publishing articles, stories, and her first novel, Ashes of Hope. She also covered 1887 commencement season in Athens for the Augusta Chronicle, bemoaning that the school was for the "sons of Georgia" alone. 


She urged women to pressure the state to provide more opportunities for women's education, and in 1889, after more overwhelming pressure via petitions and letters from the women of Georgia, the legislature passed a bill approving the first women's industrial college. Despite the widespread support of many prominent women in the state, only Julia Flisch was part of the official program for laying the cornerstone for the Georgia Normal and Industrial College (now Georgia College and State University) in Milledgeville in 1890.


Julia joined the school's faculty, teaching the secretarial skills she had learned in New York and later ancient and medieval history. She continued to write for newspapers, and spent her summers studying at the University of Chicago and Harvard. In 1899, 22 years after she had first applied to study there, the University of Georgia granted her an honorary degree, the first degree UGA ever gave to a woman; 19 years later, the first women students were admitted to UGA.


In 1905, Julia left her position to attend the University of Wisconsin. In 1908, she earned her Master's degree in history, and was offered positions at universities around the country. She chose, however, to return to Georgia, and took a position at the Tubman High School for Girls in Augusta. In 1925, she published her second novel, Old Hurricane and took the position of Dean of Women for the newly established Augusta Junior College, the first junior college in Georgia (now Augusta State University). Julia Flisch retired from teaching in 1936 due to her failing vision. She died in 1941, and is buried at Magnolia Cemetery in Augusta.


Georgia Women of Achievement honored Julia Anna Flisch, as well as Margaret Mitchell, Emily Thomas Tubman, Ruth Hartley Mosley, and Carson McCullers, as one of the important women in Georgia's history.




Learn More:

• Annals of Athens, 1801-1901 by Augustus Longstreet Hull in the Heritage collection.
• Higher Education for Women in the South: A History of the Lucy Cobb Institute, 1858-1994 by Phinizy Spalding in the Heritage collection.
• Lucy Cobb Institute Messenger 1876 on Microfilm in the Heritage collection.
• The Georgia Historical Quarterly, Volume LXXX, Number 3, Fall 1996 in the (stored) Heritage collection.
• Confederate Athens by Kenneth Coleman in the Heritage and general collections.
• College Life in the Old South by E. Merton Coulter in the Heritage and general collections.
• Women in the South: An Anthropological Perspective, edited by Holly F. Mathews in the general collection.
• Julia A. Flisch collection at the Georgia College and State University library.
• All-American Girl: The Ideal of Real Womanhood in Nineteenth-Century America by Frances B. Cogan in the general collection.
• Torches of Light: Georgia Teachers and the Coming of the Modern South by Ann Short Chirhart in the Heritage collection.
• America's Women: Four Hundred Years of Dolls, Drudges, Helpmates, and Heroines by Gail Collins in the general collection.
• Smart Choices: A Woman's Guide to Returning to School by Anne Bianchi in the general collection.
• Georgia Women of Achievement Honorees web page.

27 May 1828: "Girls beyond the power of enumeration"

On this day in 1828, the Athenian newspaper published this bit of local demographic data:

 

This population estimate seems to be for within the city limits of Athens, which was only a few blocks of downtown and the streets around North Campus at the time. The U.S. Census total population count for Clarke County in 1830 was much higher, 10,176 people. According to the 2010 U. S. Census, Athens-Clarke County has 115,424 residents. 

The numbers of carriages was an indicator of wealth, as was, apparently, the number of marriageable widows in town. A more accurate indicator can be found in the county tax records, where from 1819 to 1829, tax revenue in Clarke County increased by nearly 35%.

The University of Georgia was referred to as "Franklin College" in its early years. In 1828, total student population was 105 young white men. Women would not be admitted as undergraduates for another 90 years; African-Americans not for another 133 years. Today, the number of students at UGA's Athens campus is nearly 34,000, with a ratio of women to men of 58% to 42%, still pretty good odds for most male students.

Learn More:

• Athenian January 26, 1827 - March 13, 1832 on Microfilm in the Heritage collection.
• Athens Historical Newspaper Archive collection in the Digital Library of Georgia.
• Antebellum Athens and Clarke County, Georgia by Ernest C. Hynds in the Heritage and general collections.
• Clarke County, Georgia Tax Digests, 1811-1820, transcribed by Mary Hoit Abbe, in the Heritage and general collections.
• Clarke County, Georgia Tax Digests, 1821-1830, transcribed by Mary Hoit Abbe, in the Heritage and general collections.
• College Life in the Old South by E. Merton Coulter in the Heritage and general collections.
• The University of Georgia Under Sixteen Administrations by Robert Preston Brooks in the Heritage collection.
• The University of Georgia: A Bicentennial History, 1785-1985 by Thomas G. Dyer in the Heritage and general collections.
• Daily Life on the Nineteenth Century American Frontier by Mary Ellen Jones in the Reference and general collections.
• Atlas of Historical Geography of the United States by Charles Oscar Paullin the Heritage collection.
• The Next Hundred Million: America in 2050 by Joel Kotkin in the New Books collection.
• Way Off the Road: Discovering the Peculiar Charms of Small-Town America by Bill Geist in the general collection.
• American FactFinder on the U. S. Census Bureau website.
• U. S. News & World Reports review of the University of Georgia.
  

19 March 1914: "Want a Baby?"

On this day in 1914, the Athens Banner asked the following question of its readership:

 

The baby was the daughter of Mrs. Nancy Rosser, 19, who had died not long after giving birth. She was buried at Oconee Hill Cemetery on March 18th, 1914, in a lot owned by her aunt, Mrs. Temperance Parks. She is buried near her cousin, Cleaveland Levrett, who died at age 17 in 1911, and her grandmother, Rebecca Burns, who died at age 90 in 1912.

In June, the Banner ran a story about Mrs. Parks' attempt to gain custody of her niece's baby, by then called Ethel Luena by the hospital staff and "the young women of the neighborhood" who devoted time and care to her, and held the sleeping infant during the court proceeding. According to reports from the court, Mrs. Parks had gone to claim the child from the hospital and was turned away by the head nurse, who Mrs. Parks believed was planning to take the baby out of state. 

The attorneys for the head nurse admitted that Mrs. Parks was a blood relative of the child, and that the head nurse had denied Mrs. Parks custody. Their argument was that "for the health, the care, the progress and general food of the little one," Ethel Luena would be better off in an orphanage. There were no orphanages in Athens, so the child would be sent to another town that would have a place for her. Augusta, Hapeville, and Macon all had orphanages that took girls at this time.

The newspaper noted that Mrs. Parks lived near the Southern Mill, which indicates she and her husband were not wealthy people. Judge Charles Brand presided over the case, and ruled in favor of the head nurse, Miss Elizabeth Slaughter. 

The fate of the child is unknown, but by 1921, Mrs. Parks had left Athens and moved to Macon.  She appears as a patient at Central State Hospital in Milledgeville in the 1930 U.S. Census, and though she has a joint marker with her son at Oconee Hill Cemetery, she is not buried on the lot he shares with his cousin and grandmother.

Learn More:

• Athens Daily Banner, Feb. 17, 1914 - May 31, 1914 on Microfilm in the Heritage collection.
• Athens Banner, Apr. 1914 - Jun. 1914 on Microfilm in the Heritage collection.
• Oconee Hill Cemetery Record of Interments in the Heritage collection.
• 1912-1913 Athens City Directory in the Heritage collection.
• History of St. Mary's Hospital, Athens, Georgia by Jack Martin in the Heritage collection.
• Family Matters: Secrecy and Disclosure in the History of Adoption by E. Wayne Carp in the general collection.
• Nolo's Pocket Guide to Family Law by Robin Leonard in the general collection.
• The American Bar Association Guide to Family Law, available from the Watkinsville or Danielsville libraries in the Athens Regional Library System.
• Your Right to Child Custody, Visitation and Support by Mary L. Boland in the general and Reference collections.
• Quick and Legal Will Book by Denis Clifford in the general collection.
• Clarke County Probate Court Finding Aid to Probate Court Records in the Heritage collection.
• But for the Grace of God: Milledgeville by Peter Gordon Cranford in the Ivy Room collection at the Watkinsville library, part of the Athens Regional Library System.
• Athens Historic Newspaper collection in the Digital Library of Georgia.
• 1930 U.S. Census in Footnote Library Edition in GALILEO.

4 December 1867: Charles Holmes Herty Is Born

On this day in 1867 in Milledgeville, Georgia, Charles Holmes Herty was born to Bernard and Louise Herty. He was raised in Athens by an aunt. As a chemist, he would revolutionize the turpentine and paper industry in Georgia, and in Athens, he would establish college football at the University of Georgia.

Dr. Herty graduated with a philosophy degree from UGA in 1886, then earned a doctorate in Chemistry from Johns Hopkins University in 1890. In 1891, he took a faculty position teaching chemistry with UGA, but also focused on the role of athletics at the college level. He was the University's first Faculty Director of Athletics, and started the first football squad in 1892. He coached the team that year, then went on to help create the Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association in 1894, a forerunner to the modern Southeastern Conference.

In 1902, Dr. Herty left UGA after a dispute with department head, Dr. H. C. White, and took a position with the Bureau of Forestry at the United States Department of Agriculture.While there, he created and patented the "cut and gutter system" for collecting turpentine. His system revolutionized the industry by extending the life of the tapped trees, collecting more and higher quality gum for turpentine creation, and preserving the tree so it could be used for lumber once it was tapped out.

In 1916, Dr. Herty took another research and teaching position at the University of North Carolina, and later became an industrial consultant in the late 1920s. In 1932, he established a pulp and paper laboratory in Savannah, where he proved that pine was a viable source for pulp that could be made into newsprint. Using pine for paper helped revitalize the Southern agriculture industry, still suffering from the devestating effects of the boll weevil and the Great Depression.

Dr. Herty received many honorary degrees over the course of his career, served as president of multiple scientific associations, and directed research divisions of the Georgia Department of Forestry. In 1933, the Georgia section of the American Chemical Society created the Charles H. Herty Medal, awarded to a researcher in the Southeast "to give public recognition to the work and service of outstanding chemists." In 2000, Dr. Herty was inducted into the Paper Industry International Hall of Fame, and in 2001, the American Chemistry Society designated his Savannah laboratory a National Historic Chemical Landmark. He even has a Facebook fan page in Chinese.

Charles Herty died in Savannah in 1938, at the age of 70. He is buried in Memory Hill Cemetery in Milledgeville.


Learn More: 

• The University of Georgia under Sixteen Administrations, 1785-1955 by Robert Preston Brooks in the Heritage collection.
• Chemistry at the University of Georgia by W. H. Waggoner in the Heritage and general collections.
• The Ghosts of Herty Field: Early Days on a Southern Gridiron by John F. Stegeman in the Heritage and general collections.
• The Turpentine Industry in the United States by Charles H. Herty in Volume 181 of the Journal of the Franklin Institute, via GoogleBooks.
• A Chemist's Discovery Breathes New Life into the Old South on the ACS website.
• Paper from Pine. Chemistry: A New Chapter in Papermaking on the ACS website.
• History of Baldwin County, Georgia by Anna Maria Green Cook in the Heritage collection.
• The Charles H. Herty collection at the Georgia Historical Society.
• The Centennial History of Forestry in Georgia: A Pictorial History by Robert Lee Izlar in the Heritage and general collections.
•  From Seed to Pine Tree: Following a Life Cycle by Suzanne Slade in the children's collection.
• Looking for Longleaf: The Rise and Fall of an American Forest by Lawrence S. Earley in the general collection.
• Herty Foundation Advanced Materials Development Center website.

7 February 1905: Football Coach Wally Butts Is Born

On this day in 1905, James Wallace Butts, Jr. was born in Milledgeville, Georgia. He was a descendant of Captain Samuel Butts, a Virginia merchant who settled in Jasper County, and later fought and died with the Georgia state militia in the War of 1812; in 1825, Butts County, Georgia was named for him.

Wally Butts was captain of the football, baseball, and basketball teams at Georgia Military College preparatory school in Milledgeville, despite being only 5'6" tall and weighing 155 pounds. He earned athletic scholarships to Mercer University, where he played football for Coach Bernie Moore, later Commissioner of the Southeastern Conference. After graduation, Butts coached at the prep level for a decade, losing only 10 games in 10 years.

In 1938, he was hired as an assistant to new Georgia Bulldogs football coach Joel Hunt. During the South Carolina game in Columbia, Butts sat in the stands to look for Gamecock "weakness and strategy," and would send runners down to the sidelines with notes for the coaching staff. Georgia won 13-7.

Coach Hunt spent only a year at UGA, and Coach Butts was hired to replace him. He was 34 years old, with "the face of a cherub and the spirit of a hungry lion." For the next 21 years, he was the face of Georgia Bulldogs football, compiling a 140-86-9 record. He was known for his fiery temperament on the sidelines and during practice. Georgia's first Heisman Trophy winner, Frank Sinkwich, quit the team twice due to conflicts with Coach Butts, but in the end said that the coach "knew how to make a man out of a young punk."

Coach Butts took the Bulldogs to six bowl games, won four SEC titles, and two national championships, including a shared title in his 1946 undefeated season. In 1942, he coached the Bulldogs to a 9-0 win over UCLA in the Rose Bowl after a five-day, four-night train ride to Pasadena with no practice time and a Heisman Trophy winner with two sprained ankles. During the Second World War, he managed to have winning seasons with teams described as an "odd collection of brash young teenagers and 4Fs."

Butts served as Athletic Director through most of his coaching career at UGA, and insisted his home phone number be listed in the city directory, much to the dismay of his wife and daughters; all the phones in their house were red and black. Coach Butts also owned a diner called The Huddle on College Avenue where The Grill is located today.

Coach Butts was a longtime member of the College Football Rules Committee, served as President of the American Football Coaches Association, and was widely recognized as one of the great college coaches in the nation. For his biography, written at the end of his coaching career, the forward was penned by Ed Sullivan.

In 1960, Coach Butts retired from coaching and spent another three years as Athletic Director. In 1963, he moved to Atlanta to start the Wallace Butts Insurance Agency, which he moved to Athens several years later once the business was established. He was inducted into the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame in 1966. Coach Wally Butts died in 1973, and is buried at Oconee Hill Cemetery here in Athens.

On April 25, 1987, the Butts-Mehre Heritage Hall opened on the University of Georgia campus, housing athletic offices, facilities, and Bulldogs sports museum that is open to the public. In 1997, he was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame, and in 1998 into the Georgia-Florida Hall of Fame.


Learn More:

• No Ifs, No Ands, A Lot of Butts: 21 Years of Georgia Football by Ed Thilenius and Jim Koger in the Heritage and general collections.
• History of Butts County Georgia 1825-1976 by Lois McMichael in the Heritage collection.
• History of Jasper County, Georgia by Marsha Hayes Carnes in the Heritage collection.
• Touchdown: A Pictorial History of the Georgia Bulldogs by John F. Stegeman in the Heritage and general collections.
• Leading a Bulldog's Life by Jack Troy in the Heritage and general collections.
• Athens City Directories in the Heritage collection.
• The Pandora (University of Georgia yearbook) in the Heritage collection.
• A Walking Tour of the University of Georgia by F. N. Boney in the Heritage and general collections.
• Wally Butts page on the College Football Hall of Fame website.
• Football History page on the University of Georgia Athletic Association website.

28 December 1907 - An Escape from the Asylum

On this day in 1907, the Athens Banner published a front-page story about a young woman named Miss Este Parkman who had come to the local Y.W.C.A. claiming to be recently emancipated from the Hapeville orphanage and hoping to find a stenographer job in Athens. According the article, Miss Parkman was "tall, emaciated, even melancholy in her appearance."

When the lady disappeared the next day, it was discovered she was not from the orphanage, but had escaped from the asylum in Milledgeville, something "the authorities" at the asylum did not realize until the Y.W.C.A. called in concern over Miss Parkman's welfare. She was last seen purchasing a train ticket to Atlanta at the Southern depot, and nothing more was published about her in the surviving newspapers.

Many colleges and universities, including the University of Georgia, did not admit women in the early 20th century. For many young women, their only option was attending business school to learn stenography, shorthand, bookkeeping, and typing. The Y.W.C.A. offered these women, who frequently had leave their families to find office work in larger towns, a safe and reputable place to live. The Y.W.C.A. had women-only residences throughout the United States and all over the world. In Athens, the Y.W.C.A. was on the corner of N. Thomas and Washington Streets, where the Hilton Garden Inn is today.

Learn More:

• Athens Banner, Mar. 1906 - Dec., 1907 on Microfilm in the Heritage collection.
• Out to Work: A History of Wage-Earning Women in the United States by Alice Kessler-Harris in the general collection.
• Hope and Danger in the New South City by Georgina Hickey in the Heritage collection.
• 1909 Athens City Directory in the Heritage collection.
• History of Baldwin County Georgia by Anna Maria Green Cook in the Heritage collection.
• East Central Georgia in Vintage Postcards by Gary L. Doster in the Heritage and general collections.
• Central State Hospital history website.