Panola Land and Improvement Company Records (MC 415)

Organizational Note

The Panola Land and Improvement Company began with a petition recorded on June 26, 1884 by the Superior Court of Muscogee County, Georgia declaring the wish of Cliff B. Grimes, John Hill, Norris N. Curtis, Louis B. Garrard, and G. Gunby Jordan et al to be incorporated as the Panola Land and Improvement Company. According to the petition, "the objects of said corporation are the buying and improving Real Estate, to sell the same for cash or on installments to Stockholders or others, to aid purchasers in building houses and improving said property, to lease or rent Real Estate for themselves or to others, and to accumulate profits for the Stockholders." The charter was granted on August 1, 1884 but the organizational meeting was held 2 years later, on August 18, 1886. There were 15 shareholders present or represented at the meeting: G. Gunby Jordan (30 shares), Louis F. Garrard (30 shares), O.S. Jordan (15 shares), W. S. Greene (10 shares), H. R. Goetchius (10 shares), W. A. Little (10 shares), Cliff B. Grimes (10 shares), John Hill (10 shares), Theo M. Foley (5 shares), E. J. Rankin (10 shares), R.R. Dickinson (10 shares), John F. Flournoy (10 shares), Thomas W. Grimes (15 shares), M. E. Gray (5 shares), and B.J. Hatcher (10 shares). The initial shares were valued at $100 each. Immediately after the adjournment of the organizational meeting, the first stockholder meeting was called to order and the by-laws considered and adopted. Three new stockholders were received: George P. Swift Jr. (10 shares), W. L. Tillman (10 shares) and Moses Joseph (10 shares.) The first Directors were then elected. They were: Louis F. Garrard, John Hill, O.G. Jordon, E.J. Rankin and Moses Joseph. The newly elected Directors immediately met and unanimously elected Louis F. Garrard as President and O.S. Jordan as Secretary and Treasurer.

The Board of Directors met three or four times a year and the annual stockholders meeting was in December. There were eventually over 300 stockholders. The minutes of the Directors Meetings as well as the annual Stockholders Meetings were recorded in the same volume. These minutes detail various land purchases and development projects, including an unsuccessful fruit growing farm in Nebula, in Merriweather County, Georgia and comments concerning the "general depression in our section for the past two years". In the same meeting in August of 1892 the president's report mentioned "The failure of the promoters of the Columbus Southern Railroad (many of whom were stockholders in this company) to carry out their plan was one of the main causes of the failure of this company to consummate its intentions." Another project of the Company was the laying out and sale of lots in what is now Woodbury, also in Merriweather County.

The last Directors Meeting Minutes are dated July 8, 1894.

[Processor's note - This volume was formerly listed "MC 13 - Executive Board Meeting Minutes, 1884-1893 (Catalog 17)"]

Scope and Content

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1884-1894 1 oversized volume (.2 c.f.)

Permission to Publish

Permission to publish material from the Panola Land and Improvement Company Records must be obtained from the Columbus State University Archives at Columbus State University. Use of the following credit line for publication or exhibit is required:

Panola Land and Improvement Company Records (MC 415) Columbus State University Archives Columbus, Georgia

Provenance

This volume was found among the records of the Eagle & Phenix Mills and mis-identified as a minute book of the Mill's Board of Directors.

Note to Researchers

See also: Other Collections/Other repositories

G. Gunby Jordan Collection (MC 12)

Item List

Item 1

Board of Directors and Shareholder Meeting Minutes, 1884-1994