Why We’re Cool

Moultrian U.S. Sen. Saxby Chambliss is Georgia's senior senator and Georgia Trend's Man of the Year 2008. He's chaired the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry and currently is ranking member. He also sits on the Senate Armed Services Committee, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration.

Country Music Hall of Famer Boudleaux Bryant was from Moultrie. The late Bryant and his wife Felice together penned wildly popular classics among them "Rocky Top" first sung by Osborne Brothers and now the University of Tennessee fight song, Roy Orbison’s “Love Hurts,” later taken international by the rock group Nazareth in 1976 and a string of Everly Brothers hits "Bye, Bye Love," "All I Have to Do Is Dream," "Take a Message to Mary," "Sleepless Nights" and "Wake Up, Little Susie." As a matter of fact, "Little Susie" is Bryant's niece and is from Moultrie too. Her full name is now Dr. Susie Walker Johnson, and she lives in Huntington Woods, Michigan.

Charles M. Duke, a lunar-module pilot for the Apollo 16 space mission and the 10th and youngest man to walk on the moon, received his first flight training at Spence Air Base in Moultrie, now known as Spence Field.

Home of Flying Tiger Moose Moss and the Moose Moss Aquatic Center, an Olympic-caliber diving well that regularly hosts local, state, national and international diving meets, and the Diving Tigers, named in homage to the Flying Tigers, famed squadron of American volunteer pilots who staunched the Japanese invasion of China in 1941. Moultrie's Moss Aquatic Center hosted six countries in 1996 as a training site for the Altanta Olympics.

Home of Nate Lewis, NFL receiver and punt and kick return specialist for the San Diego Chargers and the Chicago Bears in the 1990s.

The Colquitt County Courthouse has been voted the "Prettiest Courthouse in Georgia." The 1902 Neoclassical Revival courthouse stands in the center of Moultrie's town square and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Riverside is a city within a city. Riverside occupies .2 square miles (one of the smallest towns in Georgia) and is completely surrounded by Moultrie. With a population of about 60, Riverside is unique for several reasons. Riverside was incorporated in 1907 and is the home of international uniform manufacturer Riverside Manufacturing Company, one of the largest employers in Colquitt County.

Norman Park was home to professional baseball pitcher Dennis Powell. During his career in the 1980s and 1990s, Powell, a left-handed pitcher, played for Los Angeles Dodgers and the Seattle Mariners. He signed as a free agent with the Milwaukee Brewers, the Baltimore Orioles and the Pittsburgh Pirates. Plus, he pitched for professional teams in Japan and Mexico.

Colquitt County is No. 1 in agriculture production in Georgia. Colquitt County's 588 farms contribute $390.2 million in total agricultural production value to Georgia's total value of $13.6 billion.

Pilot location for the University of Georgia Archway Partnership Program, a growing economic development outreach program. The Archway Program now serves several counties on top of Colquitt County with a definitive plan for more.

Home of Virgil Seay, NFL Super Bowl XVII Champion. In the early 1980s, Seay was a wide receiver for the Washington Redskins and later the Atlanta Falcons. He played in the Super Bowl for the Redskins in their victory over the AFC Miami Dolphins.

Home of Dewey Scarboro, record holder for the longest kickoff return for a touchdown at Georgia Tech. In 1919, the last year at Tech for infamous head coach John Heisman, Scarboro returned a kickoff 102 yards for a touchdown.

Pilot location for the University of Georgia Carl Vinson Institute of Government's Historical Tourism Initiative.

Colquitt County was recognized as 1 of 7 winners of the 2008 County Excellence competition sponsored by the Association County Commissioners of Georgia (ACCG) and Georgia Trend magazine.

Sunbelt Agricultural Expo, North America's Premier Farm Show, is held every October and attracts hundreds of thousands of visitors.

Home of 5-time All-American diver Lauryn McCalley, 2005 National Collegiate Athletic Association Woman of the Year and one of GLAMOUR Magazine's Top 10 College Women in 2004, among many other distinctions.

Maule Air manufactures the best-performing single-engine, 4 place STOL (Short Takeoff Or Landing) airplanes for a worldwide market. Maule's bush planes have been featured in several Hollywood movies, including Speed 2, Cannonball Run and Gone Fishin'.

Home of Lisa Spain Short, professional tennis player from 1984-1987 and 2008 Southern Tennis Hall of Fame inductee. Sponsored by country singer Kenny Rogers, Short won over top-10-ranked Sylvia Hanika at Wimbeldon.

Norman Park is home of Carolyn Grantham Booth, one of the All American Red Heads, the female equivalent of the Harlem Globetrotters. Booth played in the mid-1960s.

Home of Freddie Burdette, pitcher for the Chicago Cubs in the 1960s

Home of Antonio Edwards, former American football defensive end in the National Football League for the Seattle Seahawks, the New York Giants, the Atlanta Falcons, the Carolina Panthers and the Denver Broncos. Edwards ascended to Super Bowl XXXIII with the Falcons in 1998 in which he returned a fumble for a touchdown. In 2000, Edwards was the 12th pick of the XFL draft as a member of the Las Vegas Outlaws.

At Pleasant Grove Primitive Baptist Church, an unusual gravemarker of a baby elephant out of white marble stands with upraised trunk on top of a pink marble base. It was carved in homage to circus owner William F. Duggan, Sr. (1899-1950). Duggan bought the Hagen-Wallace Circus in 1947, but died before his circus ever performed. The marker is in the likeness of Duggan's favorite elephant Nancy. The gravemarker is listed in the Art Inventories Catalog of the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

Home of award-winning, syndicated columnist Dwain Walden. "The Red-Headed Editor" is known for his homespun wit, prolific writing and publishing career and the ever-present cigar stub clenched in his smiling teeth.

Grant Gillis managed the Moultrie team in the Class D Georgia-Florida League and coached football and baseball for the Packers. He led the Packers to the state football championship in 1937. Gillis helped Alabama win its first national championship over Washington at the 1926 Rose Bowl by throwing a touchdown pass to Johnny Mack Brown. Brown went on to become one of Hollywood's top cowboy stars, while Gillis later turned to baseball. He was an infielder for the Washington Senators in 1927 and later played for the Boston Red Sox.

Moultrie architect the late Wm. Frank McCall, Jr. designed some of the finest homes in Colquitt County as well as on Georgia's Sea Island near Brunswick, Atlanta and other cities around the state. His personal art collection reverently displayed in its own permanent gallery within the Colquitt County Arts Center.

Home of 1983 Georgia amateur golf champion Bob Windom.

The limestone facade of the historic Paramount Theatre (or the Howard) in Atlanta now graces the front of one of Moultrie's most memorable residences, the Robert B. Wright Jr. House. The magnificent home was designed by Wm. Frank McCall Jr.

The Ellen Payne Odom Genealogy Library is internationally revered as the premier source for researching Scottish heritage. It is home to 120 or so Scottish clan information. This is a AAA-approved attraction, containing private collections plus information on the development of the U.S. eastern seaboard and migration routes west.

The Doerun Pitcher Plant Bog is one of Georgia’s largest remaining pitcher plant bogs, supporting several species of the trumpet-shaped, carnivorous pitcher plants, including the federally endangered American chaffseed which was discovered there in summer 2008.

Doerun is the birthplace of U.S. Representative Charles Floyd Hatcher. Hatcher, a Democrat, was born in 1939 and served six consecutive terms in Congress from 1981 to 1993.

Moultrie is dubbed "The Antique Capital of South Georgia."

Home of Ray Goff, former head football coach of the Georgia Bulldogs 1989 - 1995.

Early maps of Colquitt County label it as "Piney Wastes" or "Pine Barrens" describing a large area of longleaf pine forests used mainly as a buffer zone between the Creeks and the Seminoles

Colquitt County was among the first in the U.S. to provide electricity to rural homes and farms. The Colquitt County Rural Electric Company was established just after the creation of the national Rural Electrification Administration in 1935.

The first volunteer program to assist in monitoring the threatened gopher tortoise was launched by Reed Bingham State Park. Reed Bingham's 1,613 acres are home to alligator, bald eagle, indigo snake, the rare limpkin, heron and, in the coldest winters, thousands of buzzards.

Home of John Glenn, professional baseball player for the St. Louis Cardinals in the 1960s among other leagues.

Home of Bill Hall, the 1st player from Colquitt County to make the major leagues. Hall played for the Pittsburgh Pirates in 1954.

Colquitt County High School Packers won the Class AAAA State Football Championship in 1994. The school is now Class AAAAAA.

In 2008, controversial but effective head football coach Rush Propst of the 2006 popular MTV series "Two-A-Days" took over the Packers program.

Colquitt County High School Packers won the Class AAAAAA State Football Championship in 2014.