A Quick History of the Georgia Apple Festival

Why do we celebrate apples? In the early 1900s cotton was a large part of the Georgia economy. In the ’20s the evil weevil known as the boll weevil came through and messed that up. The apple orchards saved the day for Gilmer County Georgia. In the early ’70s, we started celebrating the Apple and what it did for the local economy during the hard times created by the loss of the cotton crops. (1)

As the story goes, the apple industry was the saving grace for Georgia’s fallen cotton production due to the devastation of the boll weevil in the 1920’s. Thanks to the apple industry, Georgia was able to dust the dirt off her feet and trudge forward, even in the face of major economic impact. Around the 1970’s, Ellijay celebrated its first Georgia Apple Festival in honor of the apples, and has been celebrating them annually ever since.

Apples were certainly Georgia’s economical redemption after the fall of the cotton, but the question remains – was it the boll weevil that single-handedly caused the apple industry to move to the forefront as Georgia’s newest agricultural star?

According to a historical study done on the topic of the boll weevil, the fall of the cotton industry in Georgia was actually impacted by three additional factors as well:

1. Post-Civil War devastation
2. A new implementation of “world economy”
3. Lowered cotton prices were caused by competitive production in other parts of the world. (3)

No matter how you look at it, though, the fall of the cotton industry was saved in North Georgia by apple farming. This is the reason we celebrate apples here in Ellijay.

Apples quite literally saved our area from further damage, and today, we can enjoy this fact by delighting in our culture of fine arts, homemade crafts, food, exhibits, apple fritters, pies, and many other apple treats.