May 2
"Peg Leg" Howell BBQ & Blues Festival
Location: Eatonton City Center Stage
124A N Jefferson Ave, Eatonton, GA 31024
Time: 2:00pm – 10:00pm
The City of Eatonton invites you to enjoy a full day of authentic BBQ and incredible blues music at the “Peg Leg” Howell BBQ & Blues Festival.
Live performances by J-wonn, Shae Nycole, and Jay Wingfield & The Blaq Berry Band.
Find more info here!
May 3
Sunday at the Museum: History of Rock Eagle
Location: Old School History Museum (at The Plaza Arts Center)
305 N Madison Ave, Eatonton, GA 31024
Time: 2:00pm
Learn about the indigenous people who lived in the Piedmont area prior to the Europeans, specifically about Rock Eagle and the early archeological research by the Smithsonian and later the University of Georgia. You’ll learn how it became the centerpiece of the CCC (Civil Conservation Corps) Rock Eagle Park project in the 1930’s and later how that led to it becoming the State 4-H Center built across the lake in the 1950’s.
May 5
Meet the Authors - Ren & Helen Davis
Location: Georgia Writers Museum
109 S Jefferson Ave, Eatonton, GA 31024
Time: 7:00pm
Journalist Ren and educator Helen introduce guests to their latest book, Land of Everlasting Hills: George Masa, Jim Thompson, and the Photographs That Helped Save the Great Smoky Mountains and Blaze the Appalachian Trail.
*Pre-Registration Required.
May 7
The Surprising History of Voting & Elections in Putnam County
Location: Putnam County Administration Building
117 Putnam Dr, Eatonton, GA 31024
Time: 7:00pm
Learn how democratic participation evolved in Putnam County. Topics include: How did Putnam County debate Women’s Suffrage? How did election participation by Black county residents develop during and after segregation? What was the County Unit Voting System, how did it impact Putnam, and why was the system abolished? The presentation will include fascinating images of historical documents and photographs. The focus will be the 20th century.
May 9
The Power & Dignity of the Vote: Panel Discussion
Location: Putnam County Administration Building
117 Putnam Dr, Eatonton, GA 31024
Time: 2:00pm
Putnam County’s Black Residents Remember Jim Crow, the Civil Rights Movement, and the First Time They Voted.
Within living memory, Putnam County’s Black residents have gone from being denied the vote, to gaining limited access, and then securing full equality under the law. A panel of Black seniors who grew up in Putnam County during segregation will share their memories of that period, with a special focus on voting.
May 14
The Jazz Legacy Project - Louis Armstrong, The Father of Jazz
Location: Festival Hall
201 North Main St, Greensboro, GA 30642
Time: 7:30pm
Put simply, all American music after 1930 came from Louis Armstrong. From his trumpet masterpieces during his early days in New Orleans and Chicago, to his mass appeal vocal hits such as “Hello Dolly” and “What a Wonderful World,” he fathered the sound of American Popular Music. This show features trumpeter, singer, and Armstrong scholar Michael Cruse.
*Pre-Registration Required.
May 16
Meet the Author - Sheryl McCollum
Location: Georgia Writers Museum (at The Plaza Arts Center)
305 N Madison Ave, Eatonton, GA 31024
Time: 7:00pm
Sheryl “Mac” McCollum is an Emmy Award-winning CSI from CBS46’s CSI Atlanta, Director of the Cold Case Investigative Research Institute (CCIRI), and inductee into the National Law Enforcement Officer Hall of Fame. In her based-on-true-events novel, Swans Don’t Swim in a Sewer, what happens when a serial killer turns crime victim discovers his own daughter is the one viciously murdered? Can Sheryl use a serial killer as bait to catch a killer?
May 17
Folklife Program
Location: The Plaza Arts Center
Time: TBD
May 21
Flannery O’Connor Book Club
Location: Georgia Writers Museum (at the Putnam County Administration Building)
117 Putnam Dr, Eatonton, GA 31024
Time: 2:00pm
Led by Dr. Bruce Gentry, two-time co-director for the National Endowment for the Humanities’ Summer Institutes on O’Connor, the book club will discuss how Alice Walker’s “Convergence” is a response to O’Connor’s “Everything That Rises Must Converge.”
May 23
Searching for Ancestors - African-American Genealogy (Part I)
Location: The Plaza Arts Center
305 N Madison Ave, Eatonton, GA 31024
Time: 2 PM
In the PBS Nova documentary, Lee and Liza’s Family Tree, a family turns to science in their struggle to rediscover a history obscured by slavery. With the help of scientists and genealogists, filmmaker Byron Hurt and his family members search for their ancestors. Follow their journey as they learn about the Hurt-Waller family that has deep roots in Putnam County.
Meet Special Guest, Byron Hurt
May 30
Searching for Ancestors - African-American Genealogy (Part II)
Location: Putnam County Administration Building
117 Putnam Dr, Eatonton, GA 31024
Time: TBD
Join author Jacqueline Jones Royster in a discussion about her latest book, Finding Sarah and Mary: Unraveling African American Genealogy from the Ground Up, in which she combines memoir, family lore, DNA data, Greene County history, and national history to create an ancestral history narrative. Royster’s book offers a view of the lives and legacies of ordinary folk in the making and shaping of an American story, and demonstrates the necessity of broadening, deepening, and often upending our vision to see how our ancestors lived.
