While Georgia is still officially known as the Peach State, blueberry production has eclipsed the state's production of peaches.

English settlement began in the early 1730s after James Oglethorpe, a Member of Parliament, proposed that the area be colonized with the "worthy poor" of England to provide an alternative to the overcrowded debtors' prisons. The misconception that Georgia was founded as a penal colony persists due to the numerous English convicts who were later sentenced to transportation to Georgia.

General Sherman of the Union Army burned Atlanta to the ground during his famous March to the Sea. When the city was rebuilt after the war, it adopted the symbol of the phoenix to symbolize how it rose from the ashes.

On February 12, 1733, Oglethorpe and the first Georgia settlers arrived in the ship Anne. Landing at Yamacraw Bluff, they were greeted by Tomochichi, head chief of the Yamacraw, who gave land to James Oglethorpe to build the city of Savannah. Downtown Savannah still retains much of the original town plan prescribed by Oglethorpe (a design now known as the Oglethorpe Plan).

The Masters brings over 200,000 visitors from across the world to the Augusta National Golf Club. Membership at Augusta National is widely considered to be among the most exclusive in the sport of golf.

In 1886, when Atlanta and Fulton County passed prohibition legislation, inventor John Pemberton responded by developing Coca-Cola. It was marketed as "Coca-Cola: The temperance drink", which appealed to many people as the temperance movement enjoyed wide support at the time. The first sales were at Jacob's Pharmacy in Atlanta, Georgia, on May 8, 1886, where it initially sold for five cents a glass.

In 1829, gold was discovered in the North Georgia mountains leading to the Georgia Gold Rush. The resulting influx of white settlers put pressure on the government to take land from the Cherokee Nation. In 1830, President Andrew Jackson signed the Indian Removal Act, sending many Native American nations to reservations in present-day Oklahoma, including all of Georgia's tribes. In 1838, his successor, Martin Van Buren, dispatched federal troops to gather the tribes and deport them west of the Mississippi. This forced relocation, known as the Trail of Tears, led to the death of more than four thousand Cherokees.

The Cherokee rose (Rosa laevigata) is commonly associated with the Trail of Tears, the forced relocation of Native Americans in the southeastern United States. Its white petals are said to represent the tears Cherokee women shed throughout the U.S. government-forced march from the Cherokees' ancestral homelands to newly designated reserves. The flower's gold center is said to symbolize the gold taken from the Cherokee tribe.

The clear freshwater pools on the summit of Stone Mountain, 1,683 feet above sea level, form by rainwater gathering in eroded depressions, and are home to unusual clam shrimp and fairy shrimp. The tiny shrimp appear only during the rainy season. Through the process of cryptobiosis, the tiny shrimp eggs (or cysts) can remain dormant for years in the dried out depressions, awaiting favorable conditions.

The state of Georgia has 159 counties, more than any other state except Texas.