50 Fun Facts About Savannah

Savannah holds what distinction among the cities of its state?

Founded in 1733, it was the colonial capital and then the first state capital before Augusta took over.

Which British general landed at Yamacraw Bluff with the first settlers on 12 February 1733?

He was greeted by the Yamacraw chief Tomochichi and the traders John and Mary Musgrove.

What was the name of the ship that carried Oglethorpe and the first colonists to Savannah?

The colony's founder had chaired a Parliamentary committee on debtors' prisons and hoped to resettle Britain's 'worthy poor'.

As a colonial administrator, Oglethorpe instituted a ban on slavery and on what else in early Georgia?

Both bans were lifted within a couple of decades as the colony's economy shifted toward plantations.

How many of Savannah's original public squares survive in its Historic District?

The layout, known as the Oglethorpe Plan, arranged each ward around a central square with four residential and four civic blocks.

In the Oglethorpe Plan, what were the residential units of ten houses around each square called?

Each held ten houses, and each family was also given a 45-acre farm plot outside town.

Which of the 22 squares was the first to be laid out, in 1733, and remains the largest?

The first flag of secession raised in the South went up there in November 1860.

Forrest Gump's park bench was placed at the northern edge of which of the 22 squares?

The square is named for a War of 1812 battle, and its centrepiece is a 1910 statue of Oglethorpe by Daniel Chester French.

Daniel Chester French's 1910 statue of Oglethorpe faces south with sword drawn. Toward what?

Spain's colony was Georgia's chief enemy in the 1730s and 40s.

After capturing Savannah on 22 December 1864, Sherman offered the city to Lincoln as what?

His army of 62,000 had marched from Atlanta living off the land in what Sherman called 'hard war'.

Forsyth Park's famous fountain, installed in 1858, resembles the fountains in which Paris square?

The park covers 30 acres and is named for John Forsyth, a governor of Georgia.

Forsyth Park is named after John Forsyth, who held what office?

The park started as 10 acres donated by William Brown Hodgson and was expanded and renamed in 1851.

Bonaventure Cemetery sits on a bluff above which waterway?

At nearly 160 acres it is the largest of Savannah's municipal cemeteries and was once a plantation.

The 1994 book that made Bonaventure Cemetery famous was subtitled 'A Savannah Story'. What is its title?

John Berendt's debut stayed on the New York Times bestseller list for 216 weeks; locals just call it 'the Book'.

The book's central story concerns antiques dealer Jim Williams, on trial for the shooting of whom?

The shooting happened in 1981 at Mercer House on Monterey Square, which Williams had restored.

Who directed the 1997 film adaptation of 'the Book', with Kevin Spacey as Jim Williams?

Several characters' names were changed for the film to protect their privacy.

The Bird Girl statue from the book's cover was moved from the cemetery in 1997 to which institution?

The figure was designed as a birdseed holder; the photograph by Jack Leigh made it a tourist magnet.

The 'Book' mansion on Monterey Square was built for which songwriter's great-grandfather?

General Hugh Mercer commissioned it in 1860, but the Civil War stalled construction and it was finished around 1868 by a cotton merchant.

The Savannah-born lyricist of 'Moon River' co-founded which record label?

He wrote the words to more than 1,200 songs, including 'Moon River', and won four Oscars.

As a ten-year-old, the future 'Moon River' lyricist swept floors at which Savannah institution, founded in 1919?

The parlour was founded by two Greek immigrant brothers; it is now run by Hollywood producer Stratton Leopold.

Juliette Gordon Low founded which organisation in Savannah on 12 March 1912?

She had met Robert Baden-Powell on an ocean liner and started her first Girl Guide troop in England the year before.

What was Juliette Gordon Low's lifelong nickname?

Her family also called her 'Crazy Daisy'; a mishap with a grain of rice at her wedding left her deaf in one ear.

The Savannah College of Art and Design was founded in which year?

It opened its first classes in 1979 with 71 students; today it enrols more than 17,000 and also has campuses in Atlanta and Lacoste, France.

The Savannah Bananas play a fast-paced, fan-first version of baseball known as what?

The team is often compared with the Harlem Globetrotters, but its games are unscripted and competitive.

The Bananas' regular opponents, in the manner of the Washington Generals, are called what?

The team was founded in 2016 at Grayson Stadium after the minor-league Sand Gnats left town.

Which barrier beach town, 18 miles east of the city, was officially 'Savannah Beach' from 1929 to 1978?

The phrase 'from Rabun Gap to Tybee Light' is used to describe the whole span of Georgia.

In February 1958 the U.S. Air Force accidentally dropped what into Wassaw Sound near Savannah?

The Mark 15 weapon was jettisoned after a mid-air collision and still lies somewhere in Wassaw Sound.

Fort Pulaski, between Savannah and Tybee, is famous for an 1862 bombardment that proved what?

The new guns breached the wall within 30 hours; a young Robert E. Lee had helped build the fort.

Which Polish nobleman was mortally wounded leading cavalry in the 1779 Siege of Savannah?

About 545 soldiers from Saint-Domingue, today's Haiti, fought on the Franco-American side in the same siege.

The SS Savannah, which sailed from the city in May 1819, was the first steamship to do what?

She ran out of fuel off Cork and reached Liverpool mostly under sail; no other American steamship crossed for nearly 30 years.

The Pirates' House, Georgia's oldest bar, dates its Herb House section to which year?

It was built for the gardener of the Trustees' Garden, a botanical plot modelled on London's Chelsea garden.

How did Florence Martus, honoured by a statue on River Street, greet every ship from 1887 to 1931?

'The Waving Girl' lived on Elba Island with her brother, the lighthouse keeper.

River Street's cotton warehouses were linked to Bay Street by walkways known as what?

'Factors' were the cotton brokers who bargained on the bluff during the crop's heyday.

The cable-stayed bridge carrying US 17 over the Savannah River is named for which Georgia governor?

The city council voted in 2017 to rename it the Savannah Bridge, but the state has not gone along.

The Savannah River forms most of the state's border with which neighbour?

It runs about 301 miles from the Appalachians to the Atlantic, beginning where the Tugaloo and Seneca rivers meet.

The Wormsloe Historic Site is best known for a 1.5-mile avenue lined with which trees?

The estate was founded by Noble Jones, one of the colony's first settlers, and includes the ruins of his tabby-walled house.

The gallery that opened in 1886 in a Regency mansion on Barnard Street holds what distinction?

It grew from the bequest of Mary Telfair and now occupies three buildings, including the Owens-Thomas House.

The Owens-Thomas House, designed by William Jay of Bath, is a landmark of which architectural style?

Renovations in the 1990s uncovered one of the best-preserved urban slave quarters in the South behind the house.

Which Southern Gothic writer, born in Savannah in 1925, was filmed as a child with a backwards-walking chicken?

Pathé News showed 'Little Mary O'Connor' and her trained bird around the country.

First African Baptist, one of America's oldest Black congregations, grew from members who gathered in which year?

Holes drilled in the sanctuary floor form a tribal symbol and, by tradition, ventilated people hidden beneath it.

Which famous Methodist was minister of the city's Christ Church from 1736 to 1737?

The congregation, founded in 1733, is the longest continuous Christian congregation in Georgia.

Savannah's Congregation Mickve Israel was organised in 1735 by Jewish immigrants who had sailed from where?

The 42 arrivals of 1733 were mostly Sephardic Jews who had fled the Inquisition; their Torah scroll is still used on special occasions.

Bethesda Academy was founded south of the city in 1740 by George Whitefield as what?

It sits on his 500-acre land grant and its historic building is on the National Register.

What promotional nickname has Savannah's local government long used for the city?

The metro area of about 438,000 people is Georgia's third largest.

The Port of Savannah competes mainly with the ports of Jacksonville and which other city?

By 2021 it was the third-busiest container port in the U.S. and the largest in Georgia.

Which maker of private jets is based in Savannah?

Other big local employers include International Paper's mill and JCB's North American headquarters in nearby Pooler.

Union Camp's Savannah plant, now run by a multinational, was long the world's largest what?

It remains one of the city's largest employers, a legacy of the pine-forest industries of coastal Georgia.

The river that gave the city its name probably takes its own name from which Native American people?

They migrated to the river in the 1680s and were known locally as Shawano, Savano, Savana and Savannah; a rival theory points to the marshy 'savanna' grasslands.

The Haitian Monument in Franklin Square honours soldiers recruited from which French colony in 1779?

The Chasseurs-Volontaires were one of the few Black regiments to fight on the American side in the Revolutionary War.

By 1767 colonial Savannah was exporting almost a ton a year of which commodity to England?

Silk and indigo were the colony's early export crops before cotton took over after the Revolution.