"Where Will We Go If Not Due West?"

"What will we do without Dewy Point?"

"And po' li'l biddy Po Biddy . . . ."


Last summer came this news:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: June 22, 2006


GDOT Presents First Ever Large Print State Map


ATLANTA – The Georgia Department of Transportation has produced Georgia’s first large print map. The 2006 map is enlarged by 25 percent from the original map size and is much easier to view.

“There are a lot of young folks my age, who will appreciate how easy this is to see!” said Transportation Commissioner Harold Linnenkohl. “I am sure this will be a big hit with our citizens and visitors traveling through Georgia.”

Yesterday, the Associated Press reported:

CHATTOOGAVILLE, Ga. -- Poetry Tulip has vanished. So have Due West and Po Biddy Crossroads. Cloudland and Roosterville are gone, too.

A total of 488 communities have been erased from the latest version of Georgia's official map, victims of too few people and too many letters of type.

Georgia's Department of Transportation, which drew the new map, said the goal was to make it less cluttered and that many of the dropped communities had fewer than 2,500 residents. Some are unincorporated and so small they are not even recognized by the Census Bureau.The state began handing out the new map at rest stops and welcome centers over the summer. Gone are such places as Dewy Rose, Hemp, Experiment, Retreat, Wooster, Sharp Top and Chattoogaville, a spot in far northwestern Georgia with little more than a two-truck volunteer fire department, a few farmhouses and a country store where locals fill up their gas tanks.


"We're not under obligation to show every single community," department spokeswoman Karlene Barron said. "While we want to, there's a balancing act. And the map was getting illegible."

If you don't see it on the map of Georgia, don't blame your eyesight!