Ed Jackson and Charles Pou

The University of Georgia

February 19

1733 Because of the switch from the Julian to Gregorian calendar, events of this day are listed under the February 8, 1733 entry, along with an explanation of the calendar change.

1808 Politician David Emanuel died in Burke County, Georgia. Little is known about his early years, except that he was probably born in Pennsylvania around 1743. At some point, his family moved to Georgia. Emanuel served in the Revolution, both as a soldier and a member of the executive council. After the war, he represented Burke County in the legislature for many years, also serving in Georgia's 1789 and 1795 constitutional conventions. In 1796, Emanuel was appointed to the commission to investigate the infamous Yazoo land fraud. As president of the Georgia Senate, Emanuel became governor on March 3, 1801, when Gov. James Jackson resigned to become a U.S. senator. Emanuel served as governor for just over eight months before retiring from politics. He died at his home in 1808. Four years later the Georgia legislature named a new Georgia county in his honor.

1875 Educator Harvey Warren Cox was born in Birmingham, Illinois.

He earned his doctorate from Harvard before becoming a professor at the University of Florida in 1911. By 1916, Cox was dean of Florida's teachers' college. In 1920, Cox was chosen as first president of the new Emory University in Atlanta. He remained the university's president for the next 22 years, supervising its growth from a few loosely connected schools on an isolated campus into one of the premiere private schools in the country. Cox led Emory through the financial crisis of the Great Depression, and ultimately saw its expansion onto campuses at Oxford and Valdosta. During his presidency, financial contributions quadrupled and enrollment more than doubled. Poor health forced Cox's resignation in 1942. Two years later, he died in Atlanta on July 27, 1944.

1917 Author Carson Smith McCullers was born in Columbus, Ga. After graduating from Columbus High School in 1933, she moved to New York City, where she attended Columbia University in 1934, followed by two years at New York University. In 1937, Smith married Reeves McCullers, from whom she eventually separated, re-married, and finally divorced. The next year, they moved to Fayetteville, North Carolina, where she wrote her most famous work, The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter. In 1943, Harper's published what many consider to be McCuller's best work -- the short story The Ballad of the Sad Cafe. Her second novel, Reflections in a Golden Eye, was not well received by critics. Her third novel, The Member of the Wedding, was not only well received but also caught the eye of young Tennessee Williams, who urged her to write a play based on the book. McCullers suffered from various illnesses most of her adult life, finally succumbing to a massive stroke in Nyack, New York in 1967. In 1997, the Carson McCullers Society was created to promote scholarship in her life and works.

1919 The Pan-African Congress, organized in Paris by former Atlanta University professor W.E.B. DuBois, met at the Grand Hotel, Paris. Attending were fifty-seven delegates from the United States and African countries and colonies.

1936 John Hope, the first black president of Morehouse College (1906-1931) and Atlanta University (1929-until his death), died in Atlanta.

1942 In Washington D.C., the U.S. War Department announced that a $15 million Bell Bomber plant would be built in Marietta, Ga. A month earlier, Bell Aircraft Corporation counsel William J. O'Connor had announced that Marietta was the company's preferred location. The Marietta site was adjacent to Rickenbacker Field -- an air strip which Cobb County and the Civil Aeronautics Administration had begun building in June 1941.

Local politicians named the field in honor of World War I aviator and Eastern Airlines President Eddie Rickenbacker. Marietta seemed to be an ideal site for the bomber plant due to the availability of the air field and proximity to Atlanta. U.S. 41 was then being constructed near the site, and a trolley line from Marietta to Atlanta would help bring in workers. The February 19 announcement added that Atlanta would furnish the plant with water. (On August 8, 1942 the army would complete a 20-inch water main from Atlanta to Marietta for the exclusive use of the Bell Bomber plant.) In time Bell would employ nearly 29,000 workers and produce over 660 B-29 bombers. [Contributed by Dr. Tom Scott, Kennesaw State University]

1953 Gov. Herman Talmadge signed legislation creating a State Literature Commission. The purpose of the new agency, however, was not to promote works of literature. Rather, its three members -- who by law were to be "of the highest moral character" -- were to investigate literature "detrimental to the morals of the citizens of the State." Specifically, the commission was to investigate and recommend prosecution of anyone believed to be distributing or selling obscene literature in Georgia.

1981 Thirteen year old Curtis Walker disappeared in Atlanta;; his strangled body was discovered in a river a little over two weeks later. He was the latest victim in the Atlanta Child Murders case.

1983 Bobby Davis, Louise Fowler, Jim Hearn, Tommy Nobis, Reid Patterson, J.B. Scearce, and Mildred McDaniel Singleton were inducted into the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame.

In Their Own Words on This Day. . .

1733 Even though the construction of Savannah had begun less than three weeks earlier, James Oglethorpe was already looking to expand, as recorded by Peter Gordon in his journal:

"The 19th Mr. Oglethorp went in the scoutt boat to the Island of Tybe in the mouth of our river to pitch upon a proper place for a small setlement for some people from Carolina who desired to be admitted under his protection, and to serve as a lookout for out setlement. . . . About seven in the evening Mr. Oglethorp returned in the scoutt boat from Tybe. This day our new crane was putt up."

Source: [no author or editor cited], Our First Visit in America: Early Reports from the Colony of Georgia, 1732-1740 (Savannah: Beehive Press, 1974), p. 17.

1741 From Savannah, former storekeeper and bailiff Thomas Causton wrote the Trustees a long letter about conditions in Georgia. Among his observations was the following description of the George Whitefield's Bethesda Orphanage near Savannah:

". . .The Reverend Mr. Whitefield possesses a tract of land, wherein in the year 1739 he began what is at present called the Orphan House with several other houses (no doubt) agreeable to his purpose. The Orphan House has an handsome appearance and all the buildings are near finished. The land, which is (at present) cleared, will afford convenient gardens and yards containing about ten acres, exclusive of an avenue about 50 yards broad and half a mile in length which at present is only opened by the fall of the trees. The whole is well defended with with a good fence, and he has purchased a considerable stock of cattle. he has in a great measure defrayed the expense of making a road to Savannah for about 11 miles wherein is 12 bridges. . . ."

Source: Mills Lane (ed.), General Oglethorpe's Georgia: Colonial Letters, 1733-1743 (Savannah: Beehive Press, 1990), Vol. II, p. 558.