COMMERCE
A crowd gathers as merchants give away bales of cotton at the Covington Square. Archives | The Covington News
Newton County economy was first driven by agriculture By TAYLOR BECK
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tbeck@covnews.com
ewton County was strictly agricultural in its adolescent years, and it wasn’t until the the early 1900s that things began to change. The county’s earliest settlers, pouring in from east Georgia, the Carolinas, Virginia and others, made the most of what was then considered a vast woodland. Clearing of the land for cultivation released thousands of acres of deep fertile top soil that proved quite productive. Crops grown in the county through the years consisted of barley, corn, cowpeas, grain sorghum, hay, oats, peaches, pecans, peanuts, rye, soybeans, sweet potatoes, truck crops, watermelons and wheat. Newton farmers were also efficient producers in beef cattle, broilers, dairying, eggs, sheep, swine, and turkeys during the span of time for each commodity.
50 BICENTENNIAL EDITION
Grain crops, such as corn and wheat, grown during the early pioneer days of Newton County were important to agricultural development. These were used for corn meal and flour by the homemaker. It was also used for feed for work animals, poultry and hogs. The sawmill and pulpwood industry contributed to the growing economy of Newton County, too. However, like a lot of Georgia counties, “Cotton was king, ” and the advancement of the cotton mill brought the first sign of real success to Covington. Agriculture of the early days was carried out by the use of domestic animals (horse, mules, oxen) and primitive hand tools. Cotton farms were worked primarily with plantation slave labor prior to the Civil War. Mainly sharecroppers and day labor were used after that time. The community grew substantial as a business and agricultural center through the years and
Covington was quickly accepted as the cotton market for regional farmers. But into the 1920s, cotton production began to decline. There were a number of reasons for the decline, including the invasion of the boll weevil; the stock market crash in 1929; and over production and low prices of the 1930s, which gave rise to cotton acreage controls. Cotton production had reached an all-time high in 1920 with more than 60,000 acres in the county, but it has since, perpetually declined, reaching near zero in 1987. As result of the boll weevil, among the other factors, many residents lost everything. They gave up farming to pursue other work at textile mills and other industries across the region. Many even migrated north, specifically to Detroit, Michigan, to find work in the fast-rising automobile industry. But not everyone quit farming. Those who were able to survive THE COVINGTON NEWS
