Georgia Marble Company and Tate Historic District
Why it's listed
Tate, in the mountains of Pickens County, Georgia, is a company town built around the Georgia Marble Company. Streets wind along ridges and valleys beside Georgia Highway 53, with houses on high ground and the quarries in the Long Swamp Creek valley to the east. A railroad spur threads through town to the quarries and finishing sheds. Most homes are modest one-story pyramidal cottages, shotgun and saddlebag houses, and Craftsman bungalows built from about 1900 to 1930. Col. Sam Tate, company president from 1905, laid out much of the community and had company carpenters build the housing. Marble appears throughout the town: Tate High School of 1928 is faced in marble, the Tate Gymnasium of 1923 rests on a marble foundation, and the Tate House of 1923 is built of Etowah pink marble. Two Gothic Revival Methodist churches date from 1887, and Smoky Hollow preserves part of the African-American community. Together these resources show how marble quarrying shaped the town's work, housing and civic life.
Significance in brief: The district is a Georgia Marble Company town where the quarrying and finishing of marble shaped the community. The form describes the company's quarries, finishing sheds and railroad, and the housing and civic buildings Col. Sam Tate had built between 1905 and 1930. Marble is used in the school, the gymnasium foundation, the Tate House and the cemeteries.
Machine-generated summary. This summary was generated by a language model from the official nomination document and has not been reviewed line by line by an editor. It may contain errors. Check the source document before relying on any detail. Source: nomination document (PDF) · National Archives catalog entry. NRHP reference 05000644, listed June 10, 2005. Summary generated October 2026 (model claude-sonnet-5-5, prompt v1.0-2026-10-29, confidence medium).
Key facts
| Address | Centered on GA 53 bet GA 5 and Long Swamp Creek, Tate |
|---|---|
| County | Pickens County |
| Listed | June 10, 2005 |
| Reference number | 05000644 |
| Resource type | District |
| Architect / builder | Walker and Walker (Tate House); J. B. Hill (Tate High School); Georgia Marble Company carpenters under Luther Cartwright |
| Architectural style | Late 19th and 20th Century Revivals (Late Gothic Revival, Colonial Revival, Classical Revival); Bungalow/Craftsman; pyramidal cottage, central-hall house, saddlebag, shotgun house |
| Areas of significance | Art, Architecture, Engineering, Community Planning and Development, Industry |
| Level of significance | State |
| Status (as stated in the nomination) | Quarries, finishing plants, school, churches, cemeteries and houses remain in use. Some earlier buildings, including a hotel and drugstore, burned and no longer exist. |
| Acreage | 550 |
| Coordinates | 34.41696, -84.38826 (NPS GIS) |
What listing means for this property
This is a historic district. Buildings within its boundary are either contributing (they add to the district's significance) or non-contributing. Owners of contributing income-producing buildings can claim the 20% federal rehabilitation tax credit; homeowners should look at state credits. National Register districts impose no design review by themselves; a local historic district ordinance, if one exists, does (the difference explained).
General information, not legal or tax advice. Rules change; confirm with your State Historic Preservation Office or a qualified adviser.
Sources and further reading
- National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places database (snapshot May 2026), reference 05000644.
- Nomination form (PDF, National Archives) — catalog entry
- Wikipedia article (used for cross-checking only; text not reproduced here)
- Wikidata Q105753070
- This listing as JSON
Last updated October 2026. Found an error? See the editorial policy for how to report it.