Friday, June 20, 2008

The Antebellum Trail-Day 2

We spent the night in Milledgeville, which was the state capital of Georgia from 1803 to 1868.  On the way to our first stop, we passed this building: 
We also saw Christian Road and Coleman Tires! 

 Our first stop was at the Old Georgia State Capital.  
There is a fantastic museum inside that follows Georgia's history from the Mississippian Era Native Americans all the way through the Civil War, Reconstruction and into the early 20th century.  Coincidentally, the museum tied in well with our visit to the Ocmulgee Indian Mounds yesterday.

Here, the museum director demonstrated how the Native Americans would blow the conch shell to call to other tribes.
It was extremely loud!

All of the kids really loved this weaving in the shape of Georgia.
We were also able to visit the Legislative Chamber where the Georgia representatives voted to secede from the Union.

Our next stop was at the Rock Eagle Effigy in Eatonton.  The pictures don't do it justice.  The mound is made up of thousands of white quartz rocks from the size of a fist to huge boulders.  Some of the rocks came from hundreds of miles away. This monument was also made by the Mississippians over 2000 years ago.
To see the eagle, you have to climb up to the top of a four story tower.  
The mound is 102 feet by 120 feet and is 8 feet tall at the breast. 
 To show you how big it is, if you look closely, that's Christian standing on the sidewalk at the top.  

We had plans to stop at Andalusia and the Uncle Remus Museum today, but we somehow missed the first one and were too tired for the second.  We had a great time on our second annual road trip but we were all tired and glad to be home!

3 comments:

Kim Thomas said...

Wow! You can barely see Christian, the quartz mound is huge.

Jane said...

What a great adeventure!

Jinjer said...

I love the mound...so neat! You go on the most awesome adventures!

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