Albany, Georgia, United States

🇺🇸 Albany is a city in the U.S. state of Georgia. Located on the Flint River, it is the seat of Dougherty County, and is the sole incorporated city in that county. Located in south-west Georgia, it is the principal city of the Albany, Georgia metropolitan area, consisting of five counties – Baker, Dougherty, Lee, Terrell, and Worth. It became prominent in the nineteenth century as a shipping and market centre, first served by riverboats. Scheduled steamboats connected Albany with the busy port of Apalachicola, Florida. They were replaced by railroads. Seven lines met in Albany, and it was a centre of trade in the Southeast. It is part of the Black Belt, the extensive area in the Deep South of cotton plantations. From the mid-20th century, it received military investment during World War II and after, that helped develop the region. Albany and this area were prominent during the civil rights era, particularly during the early 1960s as activists worked to regain voting and other civil rights. Railroad restructuring and reduction in the military here caused job losses, but the city has developed new businesses.

History Albany is located in a region which was long inhabited by the Creek Indians, who called it Thronateeska after their word for "flint", the valuable mineral found in beds near the Flint River. They used it for making arrowheads and other tools. In 1830 Congress passed the Indian Removal Act, and the United States made treaties to extinguish Creek and other Native American land claims in the Southeast. The US Army forcibly removed most of the native peoples to Indian Territory, lands west of the Mississippi River.

Nelson Tift European-American settlement began with Nelson Tift of Groton, Connecticut, who took land along the Flint River in October 1836 after Indian removal. Tift and his colleagues named the new town Albany after the capital of New York; noting that New York's Albany was a commercial centre located at the headwaters of the Hudson River, they hoped that their town near the headwaters of the Flint would prove to be just as successful. It proved to be nowhere near as prosperous. Alexander Shotwell laid out the town in 1836, and it was incorporated as a city by an act of the General Assembly of Georgia on December 27, 1838.

Tift was the city's leading entrepreneur for decades. An ardent booster, he promoted education, business, and railroad construction. During the Civil War he provided naval supplies and helped build two ships. He opposed Radical Reconstruction inside the state and in Congress, and was scornful of the Yankee carpetbaggers who came in. Historian John Fair concludes that Tift became "more Southern than many natives". His pro-slavery attitudes before the war and his support for segregation afterward made him compatible with Georgia's white elite.

This area was developed for cotton cultivation by planters, who used numerous enslaved African Americans to clear lands and process the cotton. As a result of the planters' acquisition of slave workers, by 1840 Dougherty County's majority population was black, composed overwhelmingly of slaves. The market centre for cotton plantations, Albany was in a prime location for shipping cotton to other markets by steamboats. In 1858, Tift hired Horace King, a former slave and bridge builder, to construct a toll bridge over the river. King's bridge toll house still stands.

Already important as a shipping port, Albany later became an important railroad hub in south-western Georgia. Seven lines were constructed to the town. An exhibit on trains is located at the Thronateeska Heritage Center in the former railroad station.

Carey Wentworth Styles After the war, Carey Wentworth Styles moved to Albany and founded the newspaper Albany News. In the early years following the war, Styles, like Tift, took great exception to the Radical Reconstruction program then in force, and advocated for a more moderate response based on his interpretation of Georgia's rights under the Constitution. Styles backed "constitutional reconstruction" advanced by Benjamin H. Hill and sought support for the idea from the national Democratic party. While on a trip to Atlanta in May 1868, to meet with Democratic party leaders, Styles took measure of the contemporary Atlanta newspapers, and found them lacking. Styles believed them to be little more than organs for the Radical Republican reconstruction agenda. He resolved to bring a paper aligned with the Democratic party viewpoint to the Atlanta market, one supporting his constitutional reconstruction ideals. Styles moved from Albany to Atlanta, and on May 9 he announced that he had obtained the necessary financial backing to purchase the Daily Opinion. On June 16, 1868 the new Democratic daily (as he described it) printed its first edition, under the name The Constitution. Styles' tenure at the Atlanta Constitution would be brief. Unable to pay for his portion of the purchase, when the sale of his Albany News fell through, Styles was forced to surrender his interest in the paper to his joint venture partners. Styles returned to Albany as editor of the News. In 1872, he was elected to the Georgia Senate, representing Augusta and surrounding communities, in an ironic turn of events, having killed a member of the Georgia House of Representatives in his earlier years. After his legislative service, Styles sold the Albany newspaper in 1876 and returned to Atlanta.

20th century to present While integral to the economic life of the town, the Flint River has flooded regularly. It caused extensive property damage in 1841 and 1925. The city has also been subject to tornadoes. On February 10, 1940, a severe tornado hit Albany, killing eighteen people and causing large-scale damage.

On April 11, 1906, the Carnegie Library, created by matching funds from the philanthropist Andrew Carnegie, was opened downtown. Originally a segregated facility under Jim Crow laws, it was not open to African Americans until after the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. It functioned as a library through 1985. In 1992, after renovation, the building was reopened as the headquarters of the Albany Area Arts Council.

In 1912, the downtown U.S. Post Office and courthouse building opened. Other federal projects have been important to the city and region. In 1937, Chehaw Park was constructed as a part of a New Deal program under the administration of President Franklin D. Roosevelt during the Great Depression.

Major changes came with the expansion of military facilities in the city, secured by the powerful Southern Block in Congress. A U.S. Army Air Corps training base was built near Albany on land owned by the city and leased to the Air Corps for $1 a year. Construction of the base and airfield by the Army Corps of Engineers began on March 25, 1941. After being used during World War II, the airfield was temporarily deactivated between August 15, 1946, and September 1, 1947.

After the beginning of the Cold War and the founding of the U.S. Air Force in late 1947, the airfield was reactivated and upgraded with runways for a U.S. Air Force base. It was named Turner Air Force Base. The Air Force used this base for heavy bomber jets, such as the B-52 Stratofortress. A number of other Air Force units were also housed at this base. Among them were the 1370th Photomapping Group, and refueling and maintenance functions.

In 1951, the U.S. Marine Corps established a logistics base on the eastern outskirts of Albany. During the 1950s and 1960s, so many white servicemen and associated workers arrived that the city briefly became majority white for the first time since 1870.

In 1960, the population of Albany reached 50,000 people. During 1961–1962, African Americans in Albany played a prominent role in the Civil Rights Movement (see the Albany Movement). They led protests and non-violent demonstrations to end segregation of public facilities, gain the right to vote, and advance social justice. Assisted by activists from SCLC, CORE, SNCC, and the NAACP, African Americans and supporters took a stand to fight segregation through nonviolence. The city repealed its Jim Crow laws in 1963, but African Americans did not recover the ability to exercise their voting rights until Congress passed enforcement authority with the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

In 1967, the Air Force closed all its operations at the base, which was transferred to the U.S. Navy and renamed Naval Air Station Albany. NAS Albany was used as the shore base of nearly all the Navy's RA-5C Vigilante twin-jet, carrier-based reconnaissance aircraft. In 1974, the base was closed and the property was returned to the city.

In 1979, the Miller Brewing Company purchased part of the old naval base's property to build a new brewery.

The decline in military bases and railroad restructuring nationwide both led to job losses in the Albany area. Much of the remaining white population moved to suburbs and newer housing out of the city, which became majority African American in the 1970s. Struggling with a poor economy, in 1988 Albany made national headlines as the "Murder Capital of America", with the highest murder rate per capita in the United States. Other cities have since taken that title.

Some late twentieth-century floods have been extreme. In 1994, a severe flood was caused by rainfall from Tropical Storm Alberto; it killed 14 people and displaced 22,000. The state supported a $150 million renovation of the Albany State University campus to repair storm damage and complete upgrades. New housing was built on the south side of town to replace what had been destroyed. In 1998, the Flint River crested at 35 feet (11 m) above its bed and flooded parts of the city.

Because of such flooding, the city has decided against redeveloping areas along the riverfront floodplain for commercial or residential purposes. This area is being improved for other uses, with a riverfront walkway and a new aquarium built over a tributary creek.

On January 2 and 22, 2017, violent tornadoes passed through the area, claiming several lives and destroying mobile home parks in the process. On October 10, 2018 Hurricane Michael, the first major hurricane (Category 3+) to directly impact Georgia since the 1890s, plowed through South Georgia leaving widespread devastation in its path.

Geography Albany is located at (31.582273, −84.165557). It lies in a belt of historically rich farmland in the East Gulf coastal plain, on the banks of the Flint River.

Albany lies in the Upper Coastal Plain of Georgia.

Geography: Location Albany is located in south-western Georgia, 78 mi (126 km) south-east of Columbus, 151 mi (243 km) south of Atlanta, 45 mi (72 km) south of Americus, 93 mi (150 km) south-west of Macon, 39 mi (63 km) west of Tifton, 73 mi (117 km) north-west of Valdosta, 88 mi (142 km) north of Tallahassee, Florida, 70 mi (110 km) east of Eufaula, Alabama, and 84 mi (135 km) east of Dothan, Alabama.

Tree canopy As of 2010, the City of Albany had been a member of the Arbor Day Foundation's Tree City USA Program for 23 years. Tree-lined streets are common, with large, mature oaks and other native trees. The city has a Tree Ordinance and a certified arborist on staff.

**Parks, gardens, and trails ** The City of Albany Government's Recreation and Parks Department provides a diverse and comprehensive system of 77 park facilities throughout the City of Albany.

Albany's Garden Club was established in 1996 and is located on the north-east side of Hillsman Park in the Palmyra Heights neighborhood.

Albany's Riverfront Trail is a 3.1-mile (5.0 km) paved trail along the Flint River that connects Riverfront Park in downtown Albany to the Cox Landing Boat Ramp in north-east Albany, near Chehaw Park. The Oxford Environmental Park Nature Trail is an offshoot of the trail, which provides information about the ecological features of the area.

Economy Today, although the city is surrounded by pecan groves, pine trees, farms and plantations, almost none of the population is employed in agriculture. It has become heavily industrialized, and most business is conducted on a multinational scale. The city developed on both sides of the Flint River.

Health care, education and the Marine Corps Logistics Base Albany are the largest employers. Manufacturing, transportation, and retail trade are also important foundations of Albany's economy, and the city acts as a hub for commerce in south-west Georgia.

On December 17, 2008, Cooper Tire and Rubber, one of Albany's largest employers, announced plans to close the local manufacturing facility. Approximately 1,400 employees at the plant were projected to lose their jobs.

Economy: Retail Albany Mall, the premier shopping centre in the region, opened in 1976.

Economy: Business environment As a result of the Great Recession, unemployment remained higher in Albany than the country average. But in 2012 Albany continued to add more new jobs while other portions of the state were trying to stem the tide of joblessness.

Albany has a skilled workforce, makes continual upgrades to its infrastructure, and has improvements in public safety, such as its ISO fire rating of 2. It has numerous economic development initiatives, such as an Opportunity Zone, which offers a $3,500 tax credit per job created.

Economy: Top non-government employers • AT&T • Coats and Clark, Inc. • Miller Brewing Company • Phoebe Putney Memorial Hospital • Procter & Gamble • Teleperformance USA • United Parcel Service

Economy: Companies • Georgia Pacific Corp. • Kendrick Brothers • Mars, Incorporated • Mediacom • Procter & Gamble • Sherwood Pictures • Thrush Aircraft

Arts and culture The manager of a local movie theater was convicted in Jenkins v. Georgia (1972) of "distributing obscene material" for showing the film Carnal Knowledge, a popular movie directed by Mike Nichols and starring Jack Nicholson, Art Garfunkel, Ann-Margret, and Candice Bergen.

**Museums and the arts ** • Albany Area Arts Council • The Albany Chorale • Albany Civic Center • Albany Civil Rights Institute • The Albany Concert Association • Albany Municipal Auditorium • Albany Museum of Art • The Albany Symphony Orchestra • Art Park on Pine • Ballet Theatre South • Flint RiverQuarium • The Parks at Chehaw has one of two accredited zoos in the state. • RiverQuarium Imagination Theater • Theatre Albany • Thronateeska Heritage Center • Weatherbee Planetarium.

Registered historic places • Albany District Pecan Growers' Exchange • Albany Housefurnishing Company • Albany Municipal Auditorium • Albany Railroad Depot Historic District • Bridge House • Carnegie Library of Albany • Davis-Exchange Bank Building • John A. Davis House • Mount Zion Baptist Church • New Albany Hotel • Old St. Teresa's Catholic Church • Rosenberg Brothers Department Store • St. Nicholas Hotel • Samuel Farkas House • Tift Park • U.S. Post Office and Courthouse • Union Station Depot • W. E. Smith House.

Sport • Albany was home to the Albany Polecats, who were a low-A class team that played in the South Atlantic League between 1992 and 1995. Albany was also home to the South Georgia Peanuts, who played in the South Coast League. They won the South Coast League championships in the league's inaugural season (2007) and were managed by former MLB shortstop Wally Backman. The league folded after that season. • The Albany Panthers were an indoor football team based in Albany, Georgia. The team joined the Southern Indoor Football League (SIFL) during their inaugural season in 2010. When the SIFL folded, the team joined the Professional Indoor Football League in 2012. The Panthers' home games were played at the James H. Gray Civic Center until 2014. • The Georgia Firebirds were an indoor football team that played in various semi-pro leagues as well as the professional American Indoor Football in 2016 and the National Arena League in 2017.

**Memorials and sights ** • Albany Civil Rights Memorial • Albany Railroad Depot Historic District • Astronauts Memorial • Confederate Memorial Park • The Flint Riverquarium • Freedom Flame • Freedom Walk • The Guardian • Radium Springs – one of the Seven Natural Wonders of Georgia • Ray Charles Plaza • RiverFront Park • Royal Air Force Memorial • Veterans Park.

Albany State University The city is the location of Albany State University, founded as a pre-collegiate school in 1903. African Americans in the South had been intent since emancipation in gaining education and, by the turn of the 20th century, most were literate, as documented by W. E. B. Du Bois in his history, Black Reconstruction (1930). Albany State is notable as one of the few historically black colleges and universities to be part of the University System of Georgia.

Albany Technical College Albany Technical College is part of the Technical College System of Georgia and teaches post-secondary vocational and occupational training subjects.

Georgia Military College (GMC) has a site at this campus and conducts some classes here.

Troy University Albany is a site location of Troy University, one of many satellites which Troy has established throughout the Southeastern United States. For more than 20 years, Troy University, a public non-profit institution of Alabama, has taught classes both in-class and online in Albany. Troy's Albany site has classes in criminal justice, psychology and various general studies, along with offering other undergraduate and master's degree programs online.

Public libraries Dougherty County Public Library operates the public libraries serving Albany.

Festivals and events City races include a 26.2-mile (42.2 km) full marathon or a 13.1-mile (21.1 km) half marathon. The full race is ranked as one of the top Boston Marathon qualifiers in the country, with almost 20% of all marathon finishers qualifying.

The annual Mardi Gras Street Festival takes place in downtown Albany the first weekend of March. Starting at noon and running until midnight, the festival coincides with the marathon and half marathon.