SNAPSHOT: SAUER CASTLE (KANSAS CITY, WYANDOTTE COUNTY, KS)

The founders of the CountyTrip blog have always taken an interest in historic homes with haunted notorieties.  Located on a hilltop on a winding street in Kansas City, KS, the Sauer Castle (1871) is considered by some to be the finest representation of Italianate architecture the state of Kansas.

The Castle’s commissioner was Anton Sauer, a German-born businessman who moved to Kansas City from New York in 1868.  Five generations of the Sauer family resided in the mansion until Paul Berry, the owner of a home heating oil company, lived in the mansion until his own death in December 1986.

Of course, the house is reputed to be extremely haunted.  Rumors persist that all members of the original Sauer family are buried somewhere on the property.  Other legends include that of a woman who hanged herself in the tower, buried treasure, additional buried bodies, and even a secret tunnel ending at the Kansas River.  An imposing chain link fence currently surrounds the Sauer Castle, with the intention of keeping vandals, sightseers, and ghost-hunters at a safe distance.

December 2016

SNAPSHOT: ISLAND HOTEL (CEDAR KEY, LEVY COUNTY, FL)

It has long been a dream to visit both the eastern and western terminus of the Florida Railroad, and earlier this month that dream became a reality.  For those unfamiliar, the Florida Railroad was the first railroad to connect the east and west coasts of Florida, running from Fernandina Beach to Cedar Key.  Completed in 1861, at 156 miles in length, it was the longest railroad to be completed in Florida before the start of the American Civil War.

Cedar Key is an off the beaten path treasure, and the Island Hotel is the gem of the key.  It is truly amazing to find an intact antebellum structure in such a location, and even more astonishing that it is still in use.  Built in 1859, the Florida pioneers who settled Cedar Key constructed the building with remarkable hardiness, mixing oyster shell, limestone and sand to pour tabby walls 10 inches thick.  The building has survived the Civil War as well as countless hurricanes, tempests, floods, and other disasters.  After service as a general store, warehouse, and even quarters for the Yankees, the structure is now a charming, 10-room hotel & restaurant owned by a couple from Atlanta.

December 2015

Welcome Blount Countians / January Update

CountyTrip would like to thank all the Blount Countians who have visited the blog in recent days!  It is nice to hear from some ACTUAL citizens of Blount County, rather than the rental car impostors we see on the roads of Atlanta.  It is also nice to know that others are as interested as we are in finding out WHY there are so many Blounts on the road.  We have been so inspired by your comments, we are planning a trip to Blount County in the coming months.  Anyone have suggestions to sites to visit, or know someone who could show us around?

CountyTrip is also excited to announce their presence in Villa Rica, GA on February 7.  We have kindly been invited for a tour of the Connally Marchman home as well as Villa Rica’s historic districts.  More on that after the visit. Stay tuned!

SNAPSHOT: MURAL (KINGS MOUNTAIN, CLEVELAND COUNTY, NC)

Painted by Clive Haynes, this wonderful mural at the corner of Battleground Avenue and Gold Street in Kings Mountain, North Carolina depicts several key elements from the town’s storied history.  Merchant Mills was a steam saw and grist mill located on the south side of today’s West Gold Street.  The mill burned in 1895 and was rebuilt in 1898 with a cotton gin, which served local cotton farmers.  Both the window on the left and the door on the right are functional.

Wishing all of our loyal readers a Happy New Year, and a 2015 filled with new counties and adventures!

December 2014

Places in Peril 2014: A Reaction

We are both members of the Georgia Trust for Historic Preservation, and the annual release of the Places in Peril list is always a much anticipated event. We have also frequently referenced these lists when researching interesting places to visit in new counties, so if you are not already familiar with the Georgia Trust, we suggest you get to know this organization and the commendable work it does! The Trust highlights buildings that are both well-known and obscure, but most selections are quite appropriate and certainly worthy of some financial assistance and tender loving care.

Below is the official 2014 list and our reactions, with photographs, all courtesy of the Georgia Trust or Halston Pitman:

Sowega Building

Adel, Cook County, Georgia

Reaction: This is by far the most architecturally striking building in downtown Adel, and that should really tell you something about Adel. I was surprised to hear this building was in such poor condition, as on the outside, it looks rather nice! The upper stories, roof, and basement are apparently in a state of deterioration. I also did not realize that the building was vacant, as it appeared the Adel-Cook Chamber of Commerce operated out of some commercial space on the ground floor (but of course the office was closed).

In general, I have some serious qualms about Cook County, which seems to be in the midst of an identity crisis (or more likely a lack of identity crisis).  The local chamber touts their motto as “Buy Cook Live Cook Serve Cook.” I can tell you that we arrived in Adel on the day of their famed Daylily Festival in May 2013, and there was nothing to buy, nothing to live, and nothing to serve. This was at 3:45PM on a Saturday afternoon, and not a single place of business was open, and hardly a soul in sight. I’m still willing to give Cook County another chance, but really? Nevertheless, as the undisputed centerpiece of downtown Adel, the Sowega building truly deserves awareness and attention. Maybe a revamped Sowega building will spur downtown Adel to form and develop a new identity!

Blackshear Prison Camp

Blackshear, Pierce County, Georgia

Reaction: This is a fascinating and well-deserved selection. Georgia boasts a rich Civil War history, and these sites need to be preserved for future generations to appreciate and understand. Visiting the Andersonville Prison Camp was quite a treat during a previous CountyTrip, and many prisoners from Andersonville were shipped here to the then-obscure haunt of Blackshear during the latter stages of the war. What happened at the Blackshear Prison Camp is a historical footnote that truly deserves to be told, and something I knew nothing about before reading this Places in Peril list. Fortunately, we will be visiting the Blackshear Prison Camp on the next CountyTrip, which covers Southeastern Georgia! I’m particularly looking forward to it and will cover our post-visit reaction in a future post.

Chauncey School

Chauncey, Dodge County, Georgia

Reaction: This selection definitely caught me off guard. We have actually been to Chauncey (hearing about it on Vanishing South Georgia), a small cluster of dilapidated buildings hugging the railroad tracks, about 10 miles from Eastman. However, I remember seeing nothing about the school, nor did we come across it while there. I re-checked my post-trip notes from May 2013, where I described Chauncey purely as “bombed out and deserted.” There was not a single soul nor habitable building in the place. All that was there seemed to be despair and rubble.  Where is this school?!  The Trust remarks, “the town of Chauncey has been a victim of hard economic times…” No kidding. Chauncey’s problems run far deeper than historic preservation, and I question whether any money coming into Chauncey could be better spent elsewhere (but maybe this would be the only place to spend it). The school does look amazing. When I will ever be back in Chauncey, I really cannot tell you, but I will certainly be checking out the Chauncey School if ever I am in the area again.

Griffin City Hall

Griffin, Spalding County, Georgia

Reaction: We have spent some time in (underrated?) downtown Griffin, as well as toured the campus of the up-and-coming University of Georgia at Griffin, but do not recall this building.  It certainly has an interesting back story.  Next time I am in Griffin, I will definitely be paying this building a visit.

Hawkinsville Firehouse

Hawkinsville, Pulaski County, Georgia

Reaction: Wow, what a gem of a building with a notable history.  Hawkinsville is a river town (on the Ocmulgee) that has clearly seen better days, but exhibits signs and hints of the majesty and large-scale commerce it once enjoyed. I wish I had seen this firehouse while in Hawkinsville. I need to double-check which National Register of Historic Places source I reference before trips (for this particular trip, it was the not-so-reliable Wikipedia), since this was definitely not listed on the appropriate Wikipedia page. How unfortunate to have overlooked this!

Kolb Street House

Madison, Morgan County, Georgia

Reaction: Morgan will likely be the last county we visit in Georgia, and it will be nice to finish with what we fully expect to be a great county, full of well-preserved antebellum buildings and historic sites. The Georgia Trust recently hosted a Ramble in Madison and throughout Morgan County, which unfortunately I was unable to attend. Again, we will provide further commentary once the trip to Madison is made, but the proposed trail system through Madison sounds like a novel idea.

Church of the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Sharon, Taliaferro County, Georgia

Reaction: It’s always exciting to discover something new through the Places in Peril lists. Originally, I thought there was nothing more to see beyond Crawfordville in Taliaferro County, but was I ever wrong. I had no idea about the existence of this earliest of Roman Catholic Parishes in Georgia, adjacent to Georgia’s oldest Catholic cemetery and first chartered Catholic academy. I will definitely be swerving off I-20 to see this the next time I am in the area.

Greek Revival Houses of Troup County

Troup County, Georgia

Reaction: LaGrange is one of those must-visit towns in Georgia, as it is full of history and boasts an impressive and bustling downtown square. LaGrange is most known for the Hill & Dales Estate, the ancestral home of the powerful Callaway family, who still seem to rule this pocket of Georgia. The last time we were in LaGrange, there was actually a Georgia Trust sponsored Ramble happening through some of the wonderful old homes in the historic neighborhood adjacent to LaGrange College. With the massive, relatively new Kia plant and other development initiatives in and around LaGrange, I am definitely worried about the future of these antebellum homes. This is a crucial and timely addition to the Places In Peril list!

W&A Railroad Depot

Tunnel Hill, Whitfield County, Georgia

Reaction: I have been to Tunnel Hill twice, and what a historical treasure it is. I would recommend it to all of our readers. I previously posted a picture of the W&A Railroad Tunnel, the engineering wonder of the antebellum south, which is still awe-inspiring to this day. The wonderful thing about Tunnel Hill is the sheer volume of  history packed into such a small area: a speech by Jefferson Davis in 1861, the Great Locomotive Chase in 1862, several Civil War skirmishes, the Clisby-Austin house (where John Bell Hood recovered after Chickamauga; his right leg is buried on the grounds!), and the first headquarters of General Sherman during his Atlanta Campaign. This depot needs to be preserved and cherished, and Tunnel Hill’s story is one that needs to be told to future generations.

Connally Marchman House

Villa Rica, Carroll County, Georgia

Reaction: Well, maybe this building will open my eyes to Villa Rica! I have neither visited, nor heard any good things about this Carroll County hamlet (or anything in Carroll County, for that matter). Architecturally, it seems quite interesting. When I will ever be in Villa Rica, I am unsure. But if I am, I will surely check out the Connally Marchman House.

Overall, this year’s list is a great selection of buildings, sites, neighborhoods, and landmarks from across the state of Georgia that are undoubtedly worthy of time, attention, and money, and preservation. What do you all think of this years’ list?

A New CountyTrip is in the Works

Here ye Here ye.  John and I will be bringing our talents to Southeast Georgia and part of Northeast Florida before the end of the year.  We are currently in the midst of the rather laborious  planning stages of this trip, which is going to take several days on the road to properly pull off.  Please do stay tuned for future posts on how we plan and execute these trips.  It is a very rewarding process that will almost guarantee a successful outing!

Why are we embarking on this trip?  First, we need the Southeastern Georgia counties, and second, these trips are quite fun!  Our project to “collect” all 159 Georgia counties is rapidly coming to a conclusion after years in the making, and Southeast Georgia is the last overnight excursion we need to undertake.  The Georgia counties that will be covered are all positioned south of the Altamaha River, as a previous CountyTrip covered those just to the north of the Altamaha.  Just for fun, we are throwing in a few Northeast Florida counties.  As future blog posts will illustrate, North Florida boasts some VASTLY underrated counties, full of character, history, and charm. I have high hopes for the three we plan to visit.  Florida is not ALL doom and gloom, people.

Here are the counties we plan to visit:

Georgia

• Appling County
• Atkinson County
• Bacon County
• Brantley County
• Camden County
• Charlton County
• Clinch County
• Coffee County
• Jeff Davis County
• Glynn County
• Lanier County
• Pierce County
• Ware County
• Wayne County

Florida

• Baker County
• Columbia County
• Nassau County

Have you all traveled to any of these counties?  What was your impression?  Any recommended sites, attractions, or places to eat?

The Mystery of the Blount County Plates

Yes, I know.  Another entry about license plates.  Please, do not groan just yet, as I am confident you will find this tale interesting and with a splash of intrigue.  It will also supply you with a solid piece of cocktail party trivia (as promised in this blog’s first entry!).

Back to the story at hand.  When you are constantly on the lookout for rare county plates, you begin to take notice of certain trends.  One, of course, is rather drab: the proliferation of “Big Four” county plates (Fulton, Gwinnett, DeKalb, Cobb) in Georgia – in fact, they make up over 33% of the total registered passenger vehicles in the state!  This always leaves you hungry for something fresh, and when a rare county plate does not appear for you,  it is always nice to see an out of state tag every once in a while to break the monotony.  You will never be hard pressed to find a selection of Alabamas, Floridas, and Tennessees on the roads of Atlanta.

One observation that frequently came up between John and me was the proliferation of Blount County, Tennessee plates throughout the Atlanta metro area.  Everywhere we go around Atlanta, there seems to be far more than a fair share of Blount County plates on the roadways.  Here is a just a MINUTE sampling of the Blounts I have come across:

Now you may ask – what on earth is Blount County?  Don’t fret — we were asking the same question.  Neither of us have visited Blount County, nor honestly knew where it was located, so here are some basic facts on this mysterious and elusive place:

Location: East Tennessee, part of the Knoxville MSA

County Seat: Maryville

Population: 124,177 (2012 US Census estimate; 10th most populous in TN)

Notability: None?  (Maybe aside from hosting a massive DENSO manufacturing plant that makes automotive stop/starters, employing over 3,000 in the county. Or maybe as home of Alcoa, the site of a large aluminum smelting plant that serves as the town’s namesake.  Yikes.  OK, I must concede they do have Blackberry Farm, which I would enjoy visiting at some point)

With this knowledge at hand, John and I attempted to rationalize this phenomenon, but we were left with more questions than answers, chiefly:

• Why were there so many more Blounts on the roads than plates from Hamilton,  Davidson, Rutherford, Knox or Williamson, counties with significantly greater populations and virtually the same (if not better) access to Atlanta via major roadways?
• Could these people all just be passing through town?  If, so where are they going?  In fact, there is not even an interstate highway in Blount County (with the exception of the small spur of I-140 ending in Alcoa), which made it even more perplexing.
• Is there actually a method or direction to their travels?  Is everyone in Blount County literally just an itinerant gypsy, having registered their cars back in Blount for a life of endless road wanderings, never to return?
• If Atlanta is truly their destination, what could these people possibly be doing in here? Is life so incredibly mundane in Blount County that there has been some mass exodus of Blountians to the great city of Atlanta?  But if this is the case, why would they not attempt to stimulate their senses in closer cities with a similar array of amenities, such as Knoxville, Chattanooga, or Nashville?

Alas, the presence of these plates vexed us for months.  There was even talk of an East Tennessee CountyTrip to attempt to find the source of these cars and plates. Maybe there was some secret underground factory churning out cars with Blount County plates, or some nifty contraption that surreptitiously slapped a Blount County plate on every non-local car caught passing through the county.  Maybe there was some sort of secret society or guild of freemasons that used the Blount County plate as a nifty form of identification of one of their own.  Maybe it was all government conspiracy. We thought the answer would never be discovered.

Fortunately, after months without answers, the powers of Google came to my rescue. I guess I never thought anyone would take to the Internet to inquire about such an absurd and obscure phenomenon, but I was wrong.  I found two interesting threads on the topic, and I highly recommend glancing at both.  The first message board is from a Kentucky fan in South Florida fretting about the number Blount plates he sees – and the responses he gets confirm they are rental cars!  The second board, from the flyertalk online travel community, basically confirms that these are more specifically Hertz rental cars.  Chalky White gives a most interesting statement:

Someone told me that Hertz has basically paid the salary for Blount County to hire an employee that handles renewing Hertz cars. Seems like a good deal to me–pay some bumpkin $30,000 to handle a ton of renewals for your company. Saves a lot of headache and you get the benefit of having one person to talk to for all your issues.

But of all places, why Blount? dwbf11 gives the reasoning:

Blount County, Tennessee has no “Wheel Tax” meaning there is no yearly fee to re-register a license plate there. Makes sense why a large agency such as Hertz would try to plate many of its cars there, since registration fees are probably a huge annual cost, and if they can get the plate once and keep using it free of renewal charges, that would represent a huge savings.

Just for my own confirmation, I just so happened to cruise by a Hertz office on my way home from work, and low and behold, look what I saw (pardon for the blurry images.. I was in a slow moving traffic jam):

Blounts out the kazoo!  There were probably far more hiding back there.

So there you have it, and I guess we can consider this mystery solved.  Have any of you been to Blount County?  Is it worth a visit?

What’s in an MSA?

Time for some facts and figures, brought to you in large part by The United States Census Bureau – even in light of the current federal government shutdown. The city of Atlanta, according a 2012 estimate, has a total of 443,775 residents; the Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Roswell Metropolitan Statistical Area has a mind-boggling 5,457,831 residents. But what exactly is a Metropolitan Statistical Area? According to the United States Office of Management and Budget, in order to qualify as a metropolitan statistical area, there must be at least one urbanized area of 50,000 or more in population. That one is easy to understand. But also included in the MSA are counties with a minimum of 25% of workers commuting to the central counties of the metropolitan statistical area. What is still unclear to me is how the central counties are determined, but the Atlanta MSA has 15 of them: Cherokee, Clayton, Cobb, Coweta, DeKalb, Douglas, Fayette, Forsyth, Fulton, Gwinnett, Henry, Newton, Paulding, Rockdale, and Spalding. When the commuting standards are applied, there are an additional 13 counties included in the Atlanta MSA for a grand total of 28 counties: Barrow, Bartow, Butts, Carroll, Dawson, Haralson, Heard, Jasper, Lamar, Meriwether, Pickens, Pike, and Walton.

Image courtesy of the Atlanta Regional Commission

It’s not hard to see how these standards can lead to an ever-expanding web of counties and communities comprising the Atlanta Metropolitan Statistical Area. But as the number of counties included increases, the connectivity with the actual city of Atlanta and the urban core has to decrease. Let’s use Meriwether County, on the very southern fringes of the Atlanta MSA, as an example. First of all, the county is geographically distant from Atlanta. Greenville – the county seat of Meriwether County – is close to 60 miles from downtown Atlanta. It’s well over 100 miles from Greenville to Jasper – the county seat of Pickens County on the northern edge of the Atlanta MSA. Aside from the distance, the MSA standards could result in a situation where no one from Meriwether County commutes to Atlanta for work. All that is needed – and what is most likely the case – is for 25% of workers in Meriwether County to commute to a central county, which includes the much closer Coweta County and Fayette County. There may, in fact, be zero people from Meriwether County working in Fulton County, where Atlanta is located, or in the city of Atlanta itself.

Atlanta is a sprawling metropolitan area.  There is no way around that. The entire land area of the 28 counties is comparable in size to the state of Massachusetts. So, really, people of Meriwether County, how much does Atlanta figure into your daily life? How much does a place like Dawsonville or Winder figure into your daily life? My best guess for both of these questions is very little. I understand these metropolitan statistical areas are just that – statistics. And they are premised on the assumption that commuting to work is an accurate indicator of regional integration. But as more than a concept, the MSA provides only minimal value. There’s just no way these standards can cut it when it comes to determining how closely related counties and communties actually are.

Claxton, Georgia: The Fruitcake Capital of the World

The city of Claxton, Georgia is the self-proclaimed Fruitcake Capital of the World. Two bakeries in the southeast Georgia town of roughly 2,300 people produce over 4 million pounds of fruitcake every year. And one might think, with this enormous output, it would be relatively easy to get one’s hands on a piece of fruitcake there. Think again. A sojourn to Claxton, the seat of Evans County, in late June this year with Nate – with the specific intent to find and purchase fruitcake – turned into a wild goose chase in search of the elusive delicacy.

In spite of the decades fruitcake has spent as the butt of jokes (most famously, Johnny Carson’s claim that there is only one fruitcake continuously re-gifted), it is actually rather tasty. The sweet raisins, candied pineapple, and lemon and orange zest, mixed with the savory pecans and other nuts makes for a scrumptious snack. Heavy and filling, a small sliver goes a long way. But paired with a cup of coffee, it’s a unique and delicious treat I was very much looking forward to sampling.

Claxton Bakery, our first destination and the larger of the two producers, lists its business hours on its website as 8 AM to 5 PM, Monday through Saturday. This information is incorrect. When we arrived in the early afternoon on Saturday, the lights were off and the doors were locked. The Claxton Bakery was most definitely not open on this particular Saturday between 8 and 5.  And we were not amused. I could have, and in hindsight probably should have, called ahead to double check the information I had found online. But I felt safe in my assumption that a town that relies on fruitcake industry tourism for its survival would not get this one wrong. They did. I came to Claxton to buy fruitcake – for personal consumption and to gift. I also would have very likely purchased a shirt or other souvenir, tantalizingly visible through the large windows fronting Main Street in downtown Claxton. My business was a virtual guarantee for Claxton Bakery, and they failed to capitalize.

Here are a few ideas I have for Claxton Bakery:

1. This is an easy one. Change the hours listed on your website to reflect the times you are actually open for business.
2. If you are actually closed on Saturdays, consider opening, even if only for a few hours. How many people are able to travel to Claxton, Georgia midweek on a fruitcake excursion? How many people want to do this at any time? The weekend just might be a good time to attract visitors.
3. If you are going to claim to have a Twitter account, at least attempt to make use of that particular social media platform. Two tweets from November 2012 and 4 followers is not going to cut it. (There is a Facebook account that appears to be used slightly more regularly.)
4. I realize fruitcake is not exactly a modern culinary trend, but perhaps the best way to show some respect for the tradition is to get with the times. Fruitcake has been produced in Claxton for over one hundred years. Very generally, some modern business acumen is desperately needed in Claxton before the bakery goes the way of much of the rest of South Georgia – gone.
5. Watch your back. Corsicana, Texas also lays claim to the title of Fruitcake Capital of the World. If I can roll up on a Saturday and grab a piece of fruitcake at the Collin Street Bakery in Corsicana, consider this the start of my campaign to declare it the true Fruitcake Capital of the World.

The Georgia Fruit Cake Company, just down the street, did not make a claim to be open on Saturday, but having been thwarted at the Claxton Bakery, desperation was setting in. I needed some Claxton fruitcake, and I was not leaving empty-handed. We pulled into the parking lot on the off chance they were open, but a similarly darkened storefront and quiet warehouse greeted us. Most of my advice for the Claxton Bakery above is equally applicable to The Georgia Fruit Cake Company, although I don’t feel quite the same irritation when it comes to GFCC, since I never expected to be able to visit that Saturday. Maybe opening weekends would be a good opportunity for the smaller player to gain a leg up on its bigger rival?

Both fruitcake producers could learn a lesson in customer service from Mrs. Rogers Restaurant, a local fixture on Highway 301 south of downtown. A small Claxton Bakery logo is wedged next to the restaurant’s own sign, and praying this was an indication that fruitcake could be purchased inside, we stopped the car. An older man, likely the owner (Mr. Rogers?), and an employee cleaning tables welcomed us into the restaurant, even though they were technically closed between the lunch and dinner service. Both were more than happy to assist us and share their personal opinions on the treat that put their town on the map. Unlike the people at Claxton Bakery, this gentleman realized he had a surefire sale, and made the wise business decision to open his doors to us. Between the two of us, a sizeable quantity of fruitcake was purchased. The prized fruitcake of Claxton was finally ours!

Even in light of its antiquated business practices, I enjoy the product put out by Claxton Bakery. And I enjoyed gifting it to friends and family. My criticism of the company comes, to a degree, from pure annoyance, bordering on rage. But I also want this company – and its crosstown competitor – to flourish. Or at least survive. Perhaps not surprisingly, there is a not a whole lot happening in Claxton. These companies are likely important economic engines in the county. And beyond that, even though slightly absurd, the fruitcake heritage adds character and an undeniable uniqueness to the town. It really would be a shame for Claxton to lose its title as Fruitcake Capital of the World. It would be an even bigger shame if I were ever duped into making the trek to Claxton again and found the doors of the Claxton Bakery shut when they should be open.

Side Project: Georgia County Plate Collecting

Since we cannot embark on a CountyTrip every week (although I would certainly be happy if that were the case), John and I have undertaken a little side project in the Atlanta metro area.  The goal of the game is to collect a photograph of all 159 Georgia county license plates.  The rules are as follows:

1. The plate must be on a passenger vehicle
2. The photograph must CLEARLY depict the county name on the plate
3. The photograph must be taken within the Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Marietta Metropolitan Statistical Area

This undertaking has been quite fun (and frustrating at times), but it has definitely helped both of us get our county “fixes”, so to speak, without having to leave Atlanta. We have been doing this game for a while now (months), and have learned the following:

• Some cars with valuable plates will just “get away”.  It’s frustrating.  I had a pickup with a Quitman County plate disappear into the night on North Decatur Rd.  Who knows if I will ever live to see another one of those in the Atlanta area.  John has missed several Chattahoochee County plates in traffic.
• You will come to realize there is a major trade-off in this game.  It is quite tough to get in position to photograph a plate if you are not stopped at a light.  Often, you will have to choose between sacrificing your own safety and that of others, or getting a photo of a plate.  Please, always choose the former.
• Parking lots are the safest options for this game.
• There are several “hot spots” we have already identified for this game.  One is the parking lots for Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport and any of its surrounding airport hotels.  I was down in this area for work a month ago, and quickly realized what a treasure trove it was.  This makes sense, if you think about it, as people from all over Georgia drive here and leave their cars to fly out.  But it’s almost bordering on cheating to get your fill of plates here.
• Some plates will begin to hold almost legendary status to you. Counties that are rural, underpopulated, far from the interstate, extremely distant from Atlanta, and where citizens are more likely to do business in other, closer cities are among the most rare.  Currently, Clay County is the holy grail for both of us (I would say Quitman, but I magically saw one, but was unable to come away with a photo!)
• The overarching rule we have learned: if you go out looking, you will not find any.  ALL of the rare county plates we have “gotten” have been spotted just going about our daily business.  A watched pot never boils, as they say.

John & Nate’s Most Prized Plates to Date

John:

There are only 1,308 registered passenger vehicles in Webster County, Georgia.  And I have seen 2 of them.  In Atlanta.  The first was a surprise, but easy to photograph in a Buckhead grocery store parking lot (see first photo below).  The second was, at the risk of flattering myself, an exercise in patience and perseverance.  Heading east on Ponce de Leon Avenue, I was due to turn left onto Briarcliff Road when I spotted a Mercedes-Benz GLK350 adorned with a Webster County plate.  I readied myself to take a picture, but Ponce is notorious for sudden backups as cars attempt to turn left onto the numerous intersecting streets, and the Webster County car was caught behind just such a jam in the lefthand lane.  I was in the righthand lane and had no choice but to keep driving.  I began to crawl along Ponce, praying she might catch up to me.  By this point, I had already veered well off course, and just as I was about to admit defeat, I noticed in my rearview mirror the Mercedes rapidly approaching.  In a matter of seconds, she was flying past me in excess of 55 miles per hour, nearly 20 over the speed limit.  Now it was my turn to play catch up!  I felt uncomfortable driving at that speed in a regularly patrolled area, but I was already miles out of the way and had committed time and resources to documenting this luxury vehicle with a license plate from a decidedly not luxurious county.  My luck finally turned as the traffic light at North Decatur Road shifted to red, stopping both of us, and allowing me to sidle up to the SUV and snap the second shot you see below:

Nate:

Below is a photo of my most prized plate to date: a Taliaferro County.  On the way to work one morning, I saw this gentleman in his Jeep Liberty speeding up Piedmont Road toward Buckhead.  I still have no idea what this man was up to, or what business he planned to conduct in the area, but what a thrill !  It definitely took some maneuvering, but I was able to get close to the car at the intersection of Peachtree and Piedmont and snap this shot while waiting at the light. Taliaferro (pronounced “Tolliver”) is the least populous county in Georgia (with 1,703 residents), and also has the fewest registered passenger vehicles of any Georgia county (with 1,091), according to the Georgia Statistics System.  According to my calculations, that represents 0.0197% of the total registered passenger vehicles in the state.  A rare sighting indeed!

Anyway, I would definitely recommend this game to any of our readers.  If you also get a thrill from counties, you will certainly get a thrill when you see a rare county plate on the roadway.  Just make sure to stay safe out there!

P.S.: If any of our readers know the location of a Clay County, Georgia plate in the Atlanta metro area, please comment below or message us at countytrippers@gmail.com.  Thank you.