Editing Forsyth County, Georgia (section)

===20th century===
[[File:View from Indian Seats, Sawnee Mountain, March 2017.jpg|thumb|View of northern Forsyth County from [[Sawnee Mountain]]'s Indian Seats]]
The county population of about 10,000 was 90 percent White in the early 20th century, and residents still depended on agriculture. Its more than 1,000 blacks included 440 persons classified as [[mixed race]] on the census{{which|date=June 2018}}, indicating a continuing history of racial mixing that dated to slavery times.

====Lynching and other violence driving non-white people from the county====
After two different incidents in September 1912, in which black men were alleged to have assaulted white women, tensions rose in the county.
{{main|1912 racial conflict in Forsyth County, Georgia}}

In the first case, a woman claimed she awoke to find two black men in her bedroom. A black preacher was later assaulted by whites for making disparaging comments about the victim. The sheriff gained support from the governor, who sent more than 20 National Guard troops to keep peace. The suspects were never tried, for lack of evidence. In the second case, a white woman was attacked and raped, allegedly by black men; she later died of her injuries. A [[Lynching in the United States|lynch mob]] stormed the Cumming county jail and dragged out one of the suspects, Rob Edwards. They shot him and hung his body in the town square. At trial in early October, two black youths under the age of 18 were quickly convicted by an [[all-white jury]]; they were executed by hanging later that month.

Afterward, whites harassed and intimidated blacks in Forsyth and neighboring counties. Within weeks, they forced most of the blacks to leave the region in fear of their lives, losing land and personal property that was never recovered.

{{Blockquote|Almost every single one of Forsyth's 1,098 African Americans — prosperous and poor, literate and unlettered — was driven out of the county. It took only a few weeks. Marauding residents wielded guns, sticks of dynamite, bottles of kerosene. Then they stole everything, from farmland to tombstones.

Forsyth County remained white right through the 20th century. A black man or woman couldn't so much as drive through without being run out.... During the 1950s and '60s, there were no "colored" water fountains in the courthouse or "whites only" diners in the county seat, Cumming; there was no black population to segregate.<ref name="Blood">{{Cite news |last=Senior |first=Jennifer |date=September 14, 2016 |title=Review: 'Blood at the Root,' a Tale of Racial Cleansing Close to Home |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/15/books/review-blood-at-the-root-a-tale-of-racial-cleansing-close-to-home.html |work=[[The New York Times]] |access-date=June 6, 2018 |archive-date=February 11, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180211133446/https://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/15/books/review-blood-at-the-root-a-tale-of-racial-cleansing-close-to-home.html |url-status=live }}</ref>}}

By 1987, the county was "all white".<ref name=":0">{{Cite news |date=January 18, 1987 |title=White Protestors Disrupt 'Walk for Brotherhood' in Georgia Town |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1987/01/18/us/white-protestors-disrupt-walk-for-brotherhood-in-georgia-town.html |work=[[The New York Times]] |access-date=June 6, 2018 |archive-date=April 6, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220406154304/https://www.nytimes.com/1987/01/18/us/white-protestors-disrupt-walk-for-brotherhood-in-georgia-town.html |url-status=live }}</ref> In 1997, African Americans numbered just 39 in a population of 75,739.<ref name="Blood" />

====Later 20th century====
During the 1950s, with the introduction of the [[Poultry farming|poultry industry]], the county had steady economic growth but remained largely rural and all white in population. [[Georgia State Route 400]] opened in 1971 and was eventually extended through the county and northward; it stimulated population growth as residential housing was developed in the county and it became a [[bedroom community]] for people working in [[Atlanta]], which had expanding work opportunities. The opening of Georgia State Route 400 also spurred industrial growth in the South West portion of the county along the McFarland Parkway corridor starting in the early 1970s.

By 1980, the county population was 27,500, growing to 40,000 in 1987. While some blacks worked in the county in new industries, none lived there. The county gained more than 30 new industries from 1980 and unemployment was low. Such growth resulted in the median income, formerly low, "rising faster than in any other county in Georgia."<ref name="ingwerson">Marshall Ingwerson, "Facing a racial reckoning. Georgia town prepares for civil rights march", ''The Christian Science Monitor,'' January 23, 1987; accessed July 25, 2016</ref> A small civil rights march by African Americans in the county seat of Cumming in January 1987 was attacked by people throwing rocks, dirt and bottles. A week later another, much larger march took place, with civil rights activists going from Atlanta to Cumming protected by police and the National Guard. Thousands of protesters joined a counter-demonstration. Local people said conditions had been improving for minorities, but whites appeared to be reacting to the march out of fear.<ref name="ingwerson" />