Richard Peters : champion of the new South
Before there was a “New South,” there was Richard Peters. Indeed the New South begins with the arrival of Richard Peters in the rough-hewn crossroads village of Marthasville, Georgia, on 15 September 1845.
As superintendent of the Georgia Railroad, Peters came to Marthasville over a rail line he had spent ten years building. Within a few days of his arrival, he had changed the name of the community-to Atlanta. For a generation he directed the development of Atlanta and “set the city on the path to greatness.” Yet in his own time Peters was best known as an exponent of scientific agriculture. His meticulous experiments with grains, grasses, orchards, and imported livestock paid incalculable dividends for Southern-and American-farmers.