Georgia: Home to Peaches...And Books Quiz

Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts

1. Our first stop is Atlanta, the capital of Georgia. Here we learn about a journalist-turned-author who spent years in the city typing her novel about the American Civil War and Reconstruction. Who is this author of "Gone With The Wind"?

Answer: Margaret Mitchell

Margaret Mitchell was from Atlanta, Georgia and went on to become a newspaper journalist there in the early 1920s. In 1926, however, she broke her ankle and was forced to stay at home. Her husband bought her a typewriter and told her to write a novel to keep her busy.

She spent the next three years authoring "Gone With The Wind", which earned her a Pulitzer. The film made from the book came out in 1939 and won several Oscars including Best Picture. Just ten years later, Mitchell died when she was struck by a car back in Atlanta.

2. Our next stop is Eatonton, Georgia. Here we find the home of a beloved journalist, editor, and author who was good friends with Mark Twain. He took many of the stories he learned from slaves on a neighboring plantation and turned them into a book called "Uncle Remus: His Songs And His Sayings". Who is this?

Answer: Joel Chandler Harris

Harris grew up in Eatonton, Georgia in the years leading up to the American Civil War. He apprenticed as a printer at Turnwold plantation near his home and spent much of his time listening to the slaves recount stories and anecdotes. After the Civil War, he became a journalist and editor for big city newspapers in Georgia. Meanwhile, he wrote articles and short stories featuring a fictional African American named Uncle Remus who narrated tales such as "Brer Rabbit". Harris was good friends with Mark Twain until their deaths in the early 1900s.

In 1946, Walt Disney turned Harris' stories into a full length movie entitled "Song of the South".

3. We head to our next stop which is Milledgeville, Georgia. Here is the farm called Andalusia where this author lived in the 1950s, raised peacocks, and wrote numerous short stories and novels. Who is this writer of "Wise Blood" and other tomes concerning faith and fate?

Answer: Flannery O'Connor

O'Connor grew up in Milledgeville, Georgia and got her schooling at the local college there where she wrote articles and penned cartoons for the literary magazine. After receiving a Masters Degree, she spent time in New York City, where she focused on her spiritual life, which was to dominate many of her stories and books. Upon learning she had lupus disease, she moved back to Milledgeville where she wrote "Wise Blood" and raised hundreds of exotic birds, including peacocks.

After her death in 1964, a collection of her tales called "The Complete Stories" won the National Book Award.

4. Our next stop takes us to Plains, Georgia. Here we visit the home of an author who also happened to be the 39th President of the United States. Who is this former peanut farmer who went on to be a Nobel Peace Prize winner and wrote such books as "The Virtues of Aging" and "A Full Life: Reflections At Ninety"?

Answer: Jimmy Carter

Carter grew up in the 1920s in rural Plains, Georgia where he became a peanut farmer. After struggling through some rough economic times, he rose up through the political ranks to become Senator for Georgia and then Governor. He won the 1976 Presidential election and served for four years.

After a major loss in 1980 to Reagan, he went on to devote his life to advancing human rights around the world and earned the Nobel Peace Prize. During these years, he also wrote 21 books covering a multitude of topics.

He even authored a children's book entitled "The Little Baby Snoogle-Fleejer" that his daughter illustrated.

5. Our next stop is the rural area of Putnam County, Georgia. Here we visit the house where the author of "The Color Purple" lived. Who is this woman who grew up during the days of racial segregation and used those experiences to write poetry and novels?

Answer: Alice Walker

Walker and her sharecropping family lived in rural Putnam County, Georgia in the 1940s. Very shy and partially blind as a teenager, Walker turned to books and studies for solace. After college, she began to write poems and stories and to also actively participate in the Civil Rights Movement.

Her most popular book, "The Color Purple", was published in 1982 and went on to become a very successful motion picture. Since then she has written a variety of works on topics ranging from international women's rights in "Overcoming Speechlessness: A Poet Encounters the Horror in Rwanda, Eastern Congo and Palestine/Israel" to raising chickens in "The Chicken Chronicles".

6. Next we head to the Atlantic coast to the city of Savannah, Georgia. There we find the home of a Pulitzer Prize winning author (for his poetry called "Selected Poems") and writer of the autobiography "Ushant" which brings into focus his psychological issues stemming from a childhood trauma. Who is this?

Answer: Conrad Aiken

Aiken grew up in Savannah, Georgia where at age eleven he witnessed the aftermath of his father murdering his mother and then killing himself. Orphaned, he was taken in by relatives in New England where he met TS Eliot who would remain his friend for life. Over fifty years, he wrote short stories, poems, fiction novels, and non-fiction books.

Many of the subjects dealt with his psychological trauma resulting from his family's death back in Savannah. When he died in 1973 he asked that his tomb in Savannah be made in the shape of a bench so that people could sit and enjoy a cocktail there.

It was later made famous in John Berendt's book "Midnight In The Garden of Good and Evil".

7. Our next stop is St. Simons Island located off the coast of Georgia. Here is the home of the author who, having moved from Chicago, embraced the coastal area and wrote her unique genre of books concerning "biographies of unknown people". Who is this writer of such works as "The Beloved Invader"?

Answer: Eugenia Price

Price hosted a Christian radio show out of the American Midwest and wrote many non-fiction books in the 1940s and 1950s. In 1962, while traveling through the South, she decided to tour St. Simons Island and its Christ Church. There she ran across an old grave for a minister named Anson Dodge.

She moved to the area, spent years researching the man and his family, and ended up writing "fiction biographies" of his life. Her St. Simons trilogy, beginning with "Lighthouse" was hugely popular. Until her death in 1996, she continued to write and also spent time in her adopted Georgia community fighting for wildlife conservation and historic preservation.

8. Our next stop finds us in Manchester, Georgia which is the boyhood home of a prolific mystery author. Who is this man who once sailed solo across the Atlantic Ocean and has since written over 50 books with characters such as Stone Barrington and Will Lee?

Answer: Stuart Woods

Woods grew up in Manchester, Georgia and graduated from the University of Georgia. During the 1970s he took up sailing and entered a race where he piloted a boat alone from England to America. He wrote a nonfiction book about that experience and began a lifetime love of authoring.

He went on to write many mystery novels featuring a variety of characters and won the Edgar Allen Poe prize.

9. Our next stop is Washington, Georgia where we learn this was the home of a famous Civil War general known for his artillery skills. After the Civil War, he authored what is arguably one of the best analysis of the Army of Northern Virginia entitled "Military Memoirs of a Confederate". Who is this man?

Answer: Edward Porter Alexander

Alexander was born in Washington, Georgia and went on to graduate from West Point. He joined the Confederacy when his home state of Georgia seceded. He performed very well in the Civil War and was known for his innovative use of signal flags and his artillery skills.

He was a colonel when he led the cannon bombardment at Gettysburg prior to Pickett's charge. By the end of the war, he was a general. After the Civil War, he spent time in executive positions for various railroad companies and befriended Grover Cleveland.

He also wrote several books including his memoirs of the time he served in the Army of Northern Virginia. It has come to be known as one of the preeminent eyewitness accounts of the battles.

10. We find ourselves back in the capital of Atlanta, Georgia. Here we visit the house of a minister who went on to head the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and was an instrumental leader of the nonviolent civil rights movement in the 1960s. Who was this activist who also wrote many books including one called "I Have A Dream" which outlines his famous speech?

Answer: Martin Luther King, Jr

King was an African American born in Atlanta, Georgia and who grew up in the times of segregation. He attended college at a young age and soon became an ordained minister. In the late 1950s he helped found the SCLC (Southern Christian Leadership Conference) and was a key leader in nonviolent civil rights protest across the Southeast. During this time he also wrote books such as "Stride Toward Freedom" and "Strength to Love".

He delivered his famous "I Have A Dream" speech in Washington, DC in 1963.

Unfortunately, King was assassinated while in Memphis, Tennessee at the young age of 39.

Source: Author stephgm67

This quiz was reviewed by FunTrivia editor looney_tunes before going online.
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Come with me as we explore my home state of Georgia and discover the various authors that have ties there. We will visit several different cities and, based on the clue, you tell me what writer we are talking about.

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