Savannah, Georgia

• 1. Introduction

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  Savannah, Georgia was founded on the 12th of February 1733, when General James Oglethorpe and settlers from the ship Anne stepped ashore at Yamacraw Bluff. They were greeted that day by Tomochichi, leader of the Yamacraws, and by the traders John and Mary Musgrove. What Oglethorpe planted on that bluff was not just a settlement but a template. His town plan, a precise grid of streets and squares, still shapes how people move through Savannah today.

  The city that grew from that landing became the oldest in Georgia and its first capital. It sat astride the Savannah River as the southernmost commercial port in the Thirteen Colonies before the Revolution, then survived the Civil War through a calculated act of surrender rather than destruction. Today it draws millions of visitors every year to a downtown so intact that the federal government designated it one of the largest National Historic Landmark Districts in the country.

  But Savannah is also a working port handling millions of shipping containers, a city of complex demographics and sobering crime statistics, a place where a Jewish community has worshipped since 1733 and where Haitian soldiers who fought for American independence are honored in a square. How did a colonial grid plan survive nearly three centuries? What has that longevity cost, and what has it preserved? Those are the threads this documentary will follow.

• 2. Oglethorpe's Blueprint

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  James Oglethorpe designed Savannah around a recurring unit: the ward, a block of houses arranged around an open square. The city currently counts 22 such squares, strung along five historic streets running north to south, each street carrying between three and five of them. The squares range in character from the formal fountain and monuments of Johnson Square, the largest, down to the playgrounds of Crawford, the smallest.

  The plan survived remarkably intact, but not without losses. Three squares were destroyed during the urban development of the 1950s. Elbert and Liberty Squares were paved over to accommodate a realignment of U.S. Route 17. Ellis Square was demolished to build a parking garage. The city eventually reversed course on Ellis Square, razing the garage and rebuilding it underground as the Whitaker Street Parking Garage, which opened in January 2009. The restored Ellis Square reopened in March 2010. Efforts to bring back Elbert and Liberty Squares are now underway.

  Names on the squares have also changed. Calhoun Square, named for a prominent slaveholder, was the subject of a renaming movement that began in 2021. It was officially renamed Taylor Square in 2024. Chippewa Square, which honors the Battle of Chippawa in the War of 1812, holds a large statue of Oglethorpe himself. That particular square became familiar to a global audience as the location of the park bench in the 1994 film Forrest Gump.

• 3. A City Built on Trade

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  Silk was among the first commodities Savannah sent across the Atlantic. By 1767, almost a ton of silk per year was being exported to England, alongside indigo, which was also in strong demand. The plantation system then turned Savannah toward cotton, and the Port of Savannah grew into one of the most active in the United States during the nineteenth century.

  The port's growth never stopped. Savannah eventually became North America's fourth-largest port for shipping container traffic. In 2023 alone, the port handled 4.9 million twenty-foot equivalent container units, a figure that reflects a span from colonial silk exports to a modern industrial operation at the edge of the Atlantic coast.

  The city's largest private employers have shifted over the generations. For years, Savannah was home to Union Camp, which housed the world's largest paper mill. The plant is now owned by International Paper and remains one of the city's largest employers. Gulfstream Aerospace Corporation, maker of private jets, is also headquartered in Savannah, alongside TitleMax and Morris Multimedia. In 2000, JCB, the third-largest producer of construction equipment in the world, built its North American headquarters near Savannah in Pooler, drawn by access to Interstate 95.

• 4. War and Surrender

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  By the outbreak of the American Revolutionary War, Savannah had become the southernmost commercial port in the Thirteen Colonies, which made it a target. British troops seized the city in 1778. The following year, a combined force of American and French soldiers, including Haitians recruited from the French colony of Saint-Domingue, attempted to retake it at the Siege of Savannah. They failed. The British did not leave until July 1782.

  Franklin Square in the city's Historic District now holds the Haitian Monument, commemorating those Chasseurs-Volontaires de Saint-Domingue. They were among the few Black regiments to fight on the American side in the Revolution. Saint-Domingue later became independent Haiti in 1804.

  Nearly a century later, Savannah faced another occupation. Major General William T. Sherman identified the city as the prime objective of his March to the Sea, and Savannah was at that time the Confederacy's sixth most populous city. On the 21st of December 1864, local authorities chose to negotiate a peaceful surrender rather than see the city destroyed. Union troops entered at dawn. Fort Pulaski, on Cockspur Island 17 miles east of the city, had already fallen in April 1862 after Union forces used a new rifled cannon to breach its brick walls. That bombardment made all brick fortifications obsolete.

• 5. Faith and Community

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  A Jewish community arrived in Savannah in the colony's very first year, 1733. Temple Mickve Israel, which grew from that early congregation, is now the third-oldest synagogue in the United States. The Jewish community has practiced Orthodox, Reform, and Conservative traditions across the three centuries since.

  Christ Church, founded in 1733, is the longest continuous Christian congregation in Georgia. Its early rectors included the Methodist evangelists John Wesley and George Whitefield. The church still operates on its original site on Johnson Square. The First Bryan Baptist Church was organized by Andrew Bryan in 1788. St. Benedict the Moor Church, founded later, became the first African American Catholic church in Georgia and one of the oldest in the Southeast.

  Gullah-Geechee culture and Hoodoo practices also took root in the Savannah area alongside Christianity, carried by enslaved people from Georgia's coastal barrier islands. The coastal zone's indigenous inhabitants had practiced Native American religions before British colonization arrived. Today, according to the Association of Religion Data Archives, Baptists form the largest Christian group in Savannah, followed by non-denominational Protestants and Methodists, with the Roman Catholic Church as the single largest denomination. Among non-Christian faiths, Hinduism is the city's second-largest religion, followed by Judaism, Islam, and then the Baha'i faith.

  Savannah Pride Center, located in the downtown Historic District, is the only LGBTQ community center operating anywhere in Georgia.

• 6. Literature and Living Culture

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  Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, John Berendt's non-fiction book published in 1994, brought Savannah's Historic District to readers worldwide. The book is set in the Mercer Williams House on Monterey Square, the former home of Jim Williams. Clint Eastwood later directed a film adaptation. Clary's Cafe and Club One, both of which appear in the book, remain in operation.

  Flannery O'Connor was born in Savannah and lived in the city until the age of fifteen. The house where she grew up is now a museum that also offers literary programming, including an annual lecture honoring American fiction writers. The songwriter Johnny Mercer was also a native Savannahian; the American Traditions Vocal Competition, a local annual event, includes an award bearing his name.

  Savannah's arts infrastructure is extensive. The Lucas Theatre for the Arts, founded in December 1921, hosts the annual Savannah Film Festival and is owned by the Savannah College of Art and Design. SCAD also owns the Trustees Theater, formerly the Weis Theater, which opened on the 14th of February 1946 and reopened under its current name on the 9th of May 1998. The Savannah Music Festival is described as Georgia's largest musical arts festival. The annual Savannah Book Festival, held on Presidents' Day weekend, presents more than 35 contemporary authors at free events near Telfair and Wright squares.

• 7. Deepwater and Daily Life

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  Savannah lies on the Savannah River approximately 20 miles upriver from the Atlantic Ocean. The city covers a total area of 108.7 square miles, with 103.1 of that being land. At the 2020 census, the population was 147,780, up from 136,286 in 2010. The metropolitan area, defined as Bryan, Chatham, and Effingham counties, counted 404,798 residents in 2020, representing a growth of 16.45 percent over the previous decade.

  The city's income figures reflect significant inequality. As of 2010, the median household income was $29,038. By the 2022 American Community Survey, that figure had risen to $53,258, with a per capita income of $31,006. In 2010, about 17.7 percent of families and 21.8 percent of the population fell below the poverty line, including 31.4 percent of those under 18.

  Savannah is prone to flooding from heavy rainfall, its near-sea-level elevation, and a coastline geometry that amplifies surge risk during hurricanes. The city uses five canals and multiple pumping stations to manage flash flooding. The most destructive storm in the historical record was the 1893 Sea Islands hurricane, which killed at least 2,000 people. Researchers note that deaths among impoverished rural African Americans on Georgia's barrier islands may have gone unreported, making that estimate potentially low. The most recent hurricane events to affect the city were Hurricane Debby and Hurricane Helene during the 2024 season.

  The Georgia Gazette, the Georgia colony's first newspaper, began publication in Savannah on the 7th of April 1763. The Savannah Morning News, which first appeared as the Daily Morning News on the 15th of January 1850, is now the city's only remaining daily newspaper.