Towns County Jail

Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1985.

From the record

“The Towns County Jail, also known as Old Towns County Jail, in Hiawassee, Georgia was built in 1935-36 by the Federal Emergency Relief Administration and modified in 1981. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1985.”
Wikipedia article Towns County Jail, CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 2 National Register listings published here for Towns County · listed in 1985 · category: Building.

Sources: the Wikipedia article · the case file at the National Archives · the National Register database, National Park Service

The listing

What is counted as historic. The nomination lists 1 building as contributing to the listing.
Address. Courthouse Square, Hiawassee, 30546
When was it listed? September 1985
Category. building
Also known as. County Jails of the Georgia Mountains Area TR
Census division. Hiawassee
National Register reference number. 85002087 - the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.

Fires near this property

248 since 1992

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 248 fires within 5 miles of Towns County Jail between 1992 and 2020, burning about 1,475 acres in total. 3 started naturally. 27 were recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Reported cause	Fires
Debris and open burning	161
Missing data/not specified/undetermined	31
Arson/incendiarism	27
Equipment and vehicle use	9
Smoking	9
Misuse of fire by a minor	5
Natural	3
Recreation and ceremony	3

The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.

Date	Cause	Size	Reported by	Name on the report
5 September 1998	Arson/incendiarism	6.0 acres	Chattahoochee-Oconee National Forest	IVY RIDGE
18 September 1998	Equipment and vehicle use	under an acre	Georgia Forestry Commission	not named
15 September 1999	Equipment and vehicle use	under an acre	Georgia Forestry Commission	not named
13 September 1998	Arson/incendiarism	1.0 acres	North Carolina Forest Service	SNEAKING CREEK
12 September 2002	Debris and open burning	under an acre	Georgia Forestry Commission	FY2003-TOWNS-001
11 September 1999	Equipment and vehicle use	under an acre	Georgia Forestry Commission	not named
5 August 2006	Debris and open burning	under an acre	Georgia Forestry Commission	not named
13 August 1999	Debris and open burning	1.3 acres	Georgia Forestry Commission	not named

Every fire recorded in Towns County

Mines and quarries near this property

5 within 5 miles

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 5 workings within 5 miles of Towns County Jail: 3 past producers, 1 occurrence, 1 producer. 1 still produces. What was taken out: Copper, Iron-Pyrite, Corundum, Manganese, Stone, Crushed/Broken. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Site	Commodity	Status	Recorded
Bell Mtn Silica Mine	Silica	Past Producer
Berrong Prospect (Johnson Copper Prospect)	Copper, Iron-Pyrite	Occurrence	Massive Sulfide
Cynth Creek Quarry	Stone, Crushed/Broken	Producer
Hog Creek Corundum Mine	Corundum	Past Producer
Mcconell Estate	Manganese	Past Producer	1919

Every working recorded in Towns County

Storms near this property

21 since 1996

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Hiawassee, the town this property stands in, in 21 storm reports between 1996 and 2022: 10 thunderstorm wind, 8 hail, 1 tornado, 1 heavy snow. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.

When	Event	Place named	Harm	What the report says
March 1997	Tornado (F1)	Hiawassee	$75,000	no account filed
May 1999	Thunderstorm Wind	Hiawassee	$20,000	The Towns county EMA director reported 3 structures, 2 of which were houses, were damaged when thunderstorm winds knocked trees down on them. Trees and power lines were knocked down along a 6 mile wide path.
June 2018	Thunderstorm Wind	Hiawassee	$10,000	Reports were received from the broadcast media and over social media of a small dock on Lake Chatuge in Hiawassee being lifted and flipped over by strong thunderstorm winds.
July 2015	Thunderstorm Wind	Hiawassee	$6,000	The Towns County 911 Center reported a few trees down across the county.
May 2004	Thunderstorm Wind	Hiawassee	$5,000	The Towns County 911 center reported that several trees and some power lines were down in the Upper Bell Road area on the east side of Chatuge Lake.
July 2000	Thunderstorm Wind	Hiawassee	$3,000	The Towns county 911 center reported three trees down, one on Georgia 75 and two on Fodder Creek Road just northwest of Macedonia.
July 1997	Thunderstorm Wind	Hiawassee	$3,000	Several trees and power lines were knocked down countywide.
June 2013	Thunderstorm Wind	Hiawassee	$2,500	The Towns County 911 Center reported that numerous trees were down particularly in the Hiawassee area.
May 2002	Thunderstorm Wind	Hiawassee	$2,000	The Town county 911 center reported that several trees were down.
July 2002	Thunderstorm Wind	Hiawassee	$2,000	The Towns county 911 center reported that several trees and power lines were down.
June 2005	Flash Flood	Hiawassee	$250	The Towns County 911 Center reported that the Hiawassee river flooded as a result of excessive rainfall caused by repeated showers and thunderstorms associated with a spiral band that was a part of Tropical Storm Arlene moving north across Alabama and middle Tennessee. The river flooded a barn and the Enchanted Valley Resort along Georgia Highway 75 south of Hiawassee, although none of the water actually rose into the mobile homes in the area. As a precaution, a number of residents were evacuated from the resort and various fishing cabins along the river both north and south of the resort.
July 2022	Thunderstorm Wind	Hiawassee	-	Report of a tree down at Konahetah Dr and Konahetah Rd.
April 2012	Hail	Hiawassee	-	The public reported quarter sized hail in Hiawassee.
April 2012	Hail	Hiawassee	-	The public reported quarter sized hail in Hiawassee.
April 2008	Hail	Hiawassee	-	The Towns County 911 Center reported that quarter-sized hail fell east of Hiawassee. Radar data supports that this or slightly smaller hail continued to the extreme northeast corner of the county to near Tate City.
February 2005	Hail	Hiawassee	-	The Towns County 911 Center reported penny-sized hail.
July 2002	Hail	Hiawassee	-	The Towns county 911 center reported nickel size hail.
April 2001	Heavy Snow	Hiawassee	-	A retired Weather Service Specialist reported a light snow shower. This is unusually late in the spring for such an occurrence.
May 1999	Hail	Hiawassee	-	The Towns county EMA director reported dime size hail.
May 1998	Hail	Hiawassee	-	The public reported quarter size hail and a funnel cloud.
May 1996	Hail	Hiawassee	-	no account filed

Every storm recorded in Towns County

Map coverage status

No historic map-sheet match is published for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary. Browse the county's mapped places while that work is pending.

Listed places nearby

1 within 8 miles

Other National Register properties close enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties to their map sheets.

Photograph	Property	Distance	Listed
	Young Harris College Historic District	5.1 miles	1983

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 85002087 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Towns County	All 2 listed properties in this county.

Provenance

Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.