Fast Facts
- Population:
- 8,684,715
- Capital:
- Atlanta; 424,868
- Area:
- 59,425 square miles (153,909 square kilometers)
- Per Capita Income:
- U.S. $28,703
- Date Statehood Achieved:
- January 2, 1788
Flag
Atlanta began as a railhead in 1837, was burned to the ground in the Civil War, and rose again to become the transportation hub of the new South. Savannah, an industrial port and resort, was the nation's first planned city, laid out in 1733. In the northeastern uplands, tourism now supersedes textile manufacturing and farming, while pine forests in the southeast make Georgia a leading supplier of wood pulp. Farmers on the fertile Coastal Plain grow almost half the nation's peanuts, which generate some $500 million in annual revenue.
ECONOMY
- Industry: Textiles and clothing, transportation equipment, food processing, paper products, chemicals, electrical equipment, tourism
- Agriculture: Poultry and eggs, cotton, peanuts, vegetables, sweet corn, melons, cattle
—Text From National Geographic Atlas of the World, Eighth Edition
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