In the early 1900s, this area had two of the best Coca-Cola bottling plants in the industry. Mr. George Cobb owned the LaGrange and West Point Coca-Cola bottling plants which were recognized as two of the “best equipped” soft drink plants in the South. Mr. Cobb was one of the first bottlers to develop better […]Read Post ›

According to the local newspapers, it was a red-letter day when President Franklin Roosevelt drove through the Valley. The following account appeared in the Chattahoochee Valley Times on March 29, 1939: Preparations began the week of his visit – with meetings with the West Point police chief and the Secret Service. Superintendent Kirby had the […]Read Post ›

On March 30, 1939, Franklin D. Roosevelt briefly toured the Valley. Seated in the back, waving with his hat in his hand, the President is at the far left and next to him is J. Smith Lanier. The photograph above was snapped as the car drove past Lanett Mill. The photograph above shows President Roosevelt […]Read Post ›

In honor of President’s Day, this post explores a little-known connection between the LaFayette Presbyterian Church and the nation’s twentieth-eighth President. President Woodrow Wilson had an illustrious relative who lived and taught in LaFayette, Alabama. His uncle, James Woodrow, was his mother’s younger brother. James Woodrow, born in England to Rev. Thomas and Marion Woodrow, moved […]Read Post ›

Sister Gertrude, a Chambers County native whose artworks have been featured in the American Folk Art Museum, Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington D.C., and the Smithsonian American Art Museum, didn’t begin painting in earnest until her mid-fifties. She rebuffed any attempts to accept credit for her striking religious artwork. In response to questions about […]Read Post ›