Join us for a fascinating historical exploration of Georgia’s Wiregrass Region and the complex stories of survival, resistance, and adaptation that unfolded there after the 1814 Treaty of Fort Jackson.

When: 12-1 PM, Thursday, December 11, 2025

Register to join with Zoom:
https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/XHeXy9xUSCOKIPvYpMNtcQ
WWALS Board Member Janet Martin will give a brief introduction.
Questions and answers will be at the end.

Geography of Opportunity in Georgia’s Wiregrass Region, by History Instructor Vickie Everitte, a WWALS Webinar, Noon-1 PM by zoom, 2025-12-11

Native American and Passageways to Freedom within the Wiregrass Region¹

As settlers moved south of the Oconee River, drawn by the land’s economic promise, waves of migration and militia efforts reshaped the landscape—and the lives of the Native American families who called it home. Through rivers, streams, and the vast Okefenokee Swamp, Indigenous people found ways not only to endure but to carve out paths of freedom and self-determination amid the U.S. Indian Removal Policy of the 1830s.

Drawing from original correspondence between settlers, militia, and Georgia’s governors in Milledgeville, this presentation reveals how waterways became corridors of escape and survival. As Everitte reminds us, “Swamps are places on the margins — as much, they are places of transition, opportunity, and challenge.”²

About the Speaker

Vickie Everitte is an adjunct History Instructor at Valdosta State University, where she earned her M.A. in History with a concentration in Public History. She also holds an M.E. from the University of Alaska-Fairbanks and a B.S. in Secondary Social Science Education from Valdosta State College.

Now living in Tucson, Arizona, Vickie volunteers as an Educator with the Arizona Historical Society and continues her passion for historic preservation and local history projects in Valdosta. Originally from Valdosta, she grew up along the Alapaha River near Willacoochee, which was an early influence on her lifelong interest in the region’s cultural and natural heritage.

¹ Joyce Chaplin used “Geography of Opportunity” to describe Georgia’s post-American Revolutionary migratory onslaught of the planter elite into the state. I am using these words to explore Native American utilization of the Wiregrass Region, including the waterways.

² Megan Kate Nelson, “The Landscape of Disease: Swamps and Medical Discourse in the American Southeast, 1800-1880.” Mississippi Quarterly 55, 1 (Fall 2002): 567.

Map: Wider Wiregrass Region — Wiregrass Digital History Project

Free: This WWALS Webinar is free to everyone.

We recommend you support the work of WWALS by becoming a WWALS member today!
https://wwals.net/donations

Event: Here’s a facebook event so you can encourage others to come to this WWALS Webinar:
https://www.facebook.com/events/1295744602238653/

For other WWALS Webinars, see:
https://wwals.net/about/wwals-webinars/

They are usually on the second or third Thursday of the month, from noon to 1PM. After a brief introduction, the speaker has about 45 minutes, with the remaining time for questions and answers and discussion.

They are recorded, so if you miss one, you can see it later on YouTube. Here’s a WWALS video playlist:
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLKwQ5xfKf-QxWRGrV9iExlyXQIVnzOtPX&si=0Atnjwrm_ikyV-sh

WWALS Webinars are organized by the WWALS Events Committee; maybe you’d like to join that committee and help.

For more WWALS outings and events as they are posted, see the WWALS outings web page, https://wwals.net/outings/. WWALS members also get an upcoming list in the Tannin Times newsletter.

About WWALS: Since June 2012, WWALS Watershed Coalition, Inc. (WWALS) is an IRS 501(c)(3) nonprofit charity working for a healthy watershed with clean, swimmable, fishable, drinkable water.

Mission: WWALS advocates for conservation and stewardship of the surface waters and groundwater of the Suwannee River Basin and Estuary, in south Georgia and north Florida, among them the Withlacoochee, Willacoochee, Alapaha, Little, Santa Fe, and Suwannee River watersheds, through education, awareness, environmental monitoring, and citizen activities.

Our Watershed: The 10,000-square-mile WWALS territory includes the Suwannee River from the Okefenokee Swamp to the Gulf of Mexico, plus the Suwannee River Estuary, and tributaries such as the Withlacoochee and Alapaha Rivers as far north as Cordele in Georgia, as well as parts of the Floridan Aquifer, which is the primary water source for drinking, agriculture, and industry for millions of Georgia and Florida residents.

Suwannee Riverkeeper: Since December 2016, WWALS is the WATERKEEPER® Alliance Member for the Suwannee River Basin and Estuary as Suwannee RIVERKEEPER®, which is a project and a staff position of WWALS focusing on our advocacy.

Contact: Janet Martin
WWALS Membership Director
janetwwals@gmail.com
229-630-0541

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