Friday, September 27, 2024

The Georgia Backroads Traveler: Two Courthouses

 The Romanesque Revival Macon County Courthouse, Oglethorpe.

The Macon County Courthouse in Oglethorpe, Georgia, was built in 1894. Although Oglethorpe is currently a sleepy place with a population of about 1300, things were once much different. In the mid-1800s it had a population of 16,000, making it one of the largest cities in Georgia. It missed becoming the state capitol by just one electoral vote. Things are much quieter these days.

I used a nifty little software program called PT Lens to make the vertical lines parallel in this photo. Current versions of Photoshop have this feature built in, but I'm too stubborn and too cheap to pay a monthly subscription fee to Adobe for something I can work around and get by without. 

The Romanesque Revival Henry County Courthouse, McDonough.

Another Georgia courthouse in the Romanesque Revival architectural style is the Henry County courthouse in McDonough. This style was very popular in Georgia's courthouse-building boom years of 1890-1910.

This is one of my favorite compositions. I love the way the courthouse is framed by the flowers and statuary of the downtown square park. The photograph was made with a Minolta Autocord twin-lens reflex, my favorite camera, and Fujichrome Provia film in 120-size. Unfortunately, the high cost of film and processing keeps me from using the TLR much.

By the way, while many Georgia counties have their courthouses located in the downtown squares of their county seat towns, many others are located off the square, with the square itself being a city park.

About the equipment: the photo of the Oglethorpe County courthouse was made with a Canon EOS 6D digital camera with the Canon EF 24-85mm lens. The Henry County courthouse was, as I said above, photographed with a Minolta Autocord twin-lens reflex and its 75mm Rokkor lens, loaded with Fujichrome Provia transparency film.

Signed copies of my book Backroads and Byways of Georgia are available for $22.95 plus $3.95 shipping. My PayPal address is djphoto@vol.com (which is also my email). Or you can mail me a check to 8943 Wesley Place, Knoxville, TN 37922. Include your address and tell me how you would like your book inscribed.

If you would like to have a print of any of my photographs, check out my online gallery at https://davejenkins.pixels.com/  If you don't find what you want there, let me know and I'll arrange to include it in the gallery.

Photography and text copyright 2024 David B.Jenkins.

I post Monday, Wednesday, and Friday unless life gets in the way.

Soli Gloria Deo -- For the glory of God alone.

Tags:   photography    digital photography     film photography      travel      Georgia      courthouses      Canon EOS 6D camera     Fujichrome Provia film        Minolta Autocord camera    Twin-Lens Reflex    Canon EF 24-85mm lens

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