Ed Jackson and Charles Pou

Carl Vinson Institute of Government

The University of Georgia

August 1

1790 The first U.S. census was reported. Out of a national population of 3,929,214 (3,172,006 white and 757,208 black), Georgia has a total population of 82,548 (52,886 white and 29,662 black).

1832 In New Echota, capital of the Cherokee Nation, Elias Boudinot resigned as editor of the Cherokee Phoenix. Boudinot had begun to feel the inevitability of Cherokee removal to the West, but principal chief John Ross and a majority of the Cherokees opposed leaving their homeland. Because Ross felt that the Phoenix was the official organ of the Cherokee Nation, he would not allow Boudinot to discuss arguments for and against voluntary removal in the newspaper -- so Boudinot resigned.

1866 Cherokee chief John Ross died in Washington, D.C. Born in Turkey Town in the Cherokee Nation, Ross was only one-eighth Cherokee. By the early 1800s, he had established a ferry and warehouse business on the Tennessee River known as Ross's Landing (site of present-day Chattanooga). In the 1820s, Ross moved to Head of Coosa, the point marking the confluence of the Etowah and Oostanaula rivers which later became Rome, Ga. In 1828, Ross was elected principal chief of the Cherokees, in which capacity he unsuccessfully fought efforts by the federal government and Georgia to move the Cherokees from their homeland to the Indian Territory in what is now Oklahoma. During the Civil War, he and his family moved to Washington, D.C., where they were living at the time of his death.

1895 Black educator and civil rights advocate Benjamin Mays was born in rural South Carolina, son of former slaves turned tenant farmers. Committed to the importance of education, Mays attended several colleges before obtaining his doctorate from the University of Chicago in 1935. Later, he became president of Morehouse College. At age 72, he became the first black president of the Atlanta Board of Education, a position he held for 12 years. During his life, he received 49 honorary doctorate degrees.

1913 During the fifth day of the trial of Leo Frank, Dr. Roy Harris, who had examined Mary Phagan's body, testified that she had died within an hour of eating her last meal of cabbage and bread -- meaning she died sometime in the hour between twelve and one o'clock. He also said the head wounds were caused by a human fist. After suffering a fainting spell, Dr. Harris had to leave the stand before completing his testimony. Assistant factory superintendent N.V. Darley said Frank was nervous the day of the murder, but that this wasn't unusual. Darley said he had seen Frank talking to Gantt and assumed this accounted for his nervousness. Darley's testimony was marked by more bitter clashes between prosecutor Dorsey and defense attorney Rosser. Maggie White, wife of one of the machinists working at the factory April 26th, testified she went to the factory twice that day to visit her husband. She had seen Leo Frank both times, the second time around 12:30 in his office. He had his back turned to her and was startled when she walked in, but then told her it was fine to go see her husband. She said she left shortly before 1:00 and saw a Negro hiding behind some boxes on the first floor. Click here for a detailed accounting of the case.

1936 On his birthday, Benjamin Mays was named president of Morehouse College in Atlanta. During his presidency, the college's enrollment doubled, while its endowment increased four-fold.

1953 Blues singer, guitarist, and song writer Robert Cray was born in Columbus, Georgia. Cray would win a 1987 Grammy Award.

1961 Inducted into the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame were George Gardner, Thomas Greene Jr., William Hunnicutt, Thomas Paris, Dr. Alfred Scott, and Kimsey Stewart.

1982 Former Atlanta Braves slugger Hank Aaron was inducted in the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y. Aaron came nine votes shy of being elected unanimously -- the third highest percentage of votes, only surpassed by Ty Cobb and Tom Seaver.

1996 This was the fourteenth day of the 1996 Summer Olympics -- and day 13 of Olympic competition. 

Georgia cities and towns incorporated by acts approved on Aug. 1:

1904 Matthews (Jefferson County)

1906 Mullis (Laurens County)

1912 Bridgeboro (Worth County) and Howell (Echols County)

In Their Own Words on This Day. . .

1734 In London, the Earl of Egmont recorded in his diary a report of the meeting of Tomochichi and the other Yamacraw Indians with King George II and the queen:

". . . Mr. Verelts [sic] acquainted me that the King Toma-Chiki and the rest of the Indians was very well satisfied with their audience at Court, but were much afflicted with the death of their comrade, who was a cousin of the King's. On that occasion they sat up all night, crying and bewailing his loss. Toma-Chike told Mr. Verelts, our accountant, that his relation was gone to God, that he would see us no more, but he should see him, and believed he should be the first; that all he desired was that one of the company here might live to carry back our King's answer to his countrymen. Mr. Verelts asked him how he was pleased and what he observed at Court, to which he replied that they carried him through a great many houses (he meant rooms) to make him believe the King's Palace consisted of many, but he was surprised to find he returned by the same stairs he went up, by which he found it was still one house. He added that he found we knew a great many more things than they, but he doubted if we were happier, since we are worse livers than they, and they more innocent.

"The Queen called for the boy, his nephew [Toonahowi], after the audience she gave them all was over, stroked his face, and told him he must come again to see her, for she had a present for him. He answer her in English, and is forward in his learning. Mr. Smith, of our Society, coming three times a week to instruct him in the principles of Christianity. He can say the Lord's Prayer, Belief, and Ten Commandments, but I fear all this will be lost at his return. They went on Friday last to Mr. Oglethorp's in Surrey to dissipate their sorrow for the death of their friend, and returned this night. . . ."

Source: U.K. Historical Manuscripts Commission, Diary of the First Earl of Egmont (London: His Majesty's Stationery Office, 1923), Vol. II, pp. 119-120.

1740 From Ebenezer, John Martin Boltzius recorded in his journal a meeting with someone who had been with James Oglethorpe on his failed siege of St. Augustine:

"Before the morning divine service an Englishman came to me with a letter asking me to help him get to Old Ebenezer. He had been interpreter for the Indians in the camp with Mr. Oglethorpe and was supposed to bring them home and take some other back. . . . He said that Mr. Oglethorpe was at Frederica with all his men, waiting for some regiments of soldiers from England, and that he intended to mount a new attack on St. Augustine in October. Because he had too few troops, he could not get to the fortress, because they fired their cannons so heavily from within. . . . In the meantime, although little else has been accomplished, Mr. Oglethorpe now knows the whole region around St. Augustine, because of which he expects a big advantage in the future. He cause no damage to be done in the fields, gardens, and houses before St. Augustine, except what the Indians did, because he hoped to put everything to better use than letting it be consumed by fire. Mr. Oglethorpe is said to have endured more hardships than any of his soldiers; and, although he was always ailing because of the constant dampness above and below, he was always at the front in all important actions.

"There are many lies and slanders being spread in the country by Carolinians, which cause him [Oglethorpe] some unease, as do those persons lost inside a fort [Fort Mose]. . . ."

Source: George Fenwick Jones and Don Savelle (ed. and trans.), Detailed Reports on the Salzburger Emigrants Who Settled in America . . . Edited by Samuel Urlsperger (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1983), Vol. 7, pp. 203-204.

1870 For a variety of reasons, financial problems beset many families in Georgia during Reconstruction. From Richmond County, Gertrude Thomas recorded in her diary the sadness and humiliation of losing their property, which she attributes in part to her husband's poor handling of their financial affairs:

". . . I do not like to record my dull heavy moments in my Journal. I would like for it to record nothing but brightness and sunshine, but life is made up of light and shadows and my own is not an exception. . . . I well remember going to the rink to witness the skating with the consciousness never absent during the morning that everyone who looked upon me would remember that a few days before, at the market, my husband had had his property sold by the sheriff -- and I well remember that never had I looked brighter or jested more merrily, while secretly I writhed in mortified pride. The first bitter agony is over and now I, yes I must be candid, I forget it, at times. You ask me if I am a better woman for this chastening. I answer, No -- at heart I am rebellious still. Yet, in my own conscience, I think a great deal of what we call bad luck is bad management."

Source: Virginia Ingraham Burr (ed.), The Secret Eye: The Journal of Ella Gertrude Clanton Thomas, 1848-1889 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1990), pp. 333-334.

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© Carl Vinson Institute of Government, University of Georgia

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