Cuthbert, GA

Cuthbert is Randolph County's seat in southwest Georgia, where U.S. 27 and U.S. 82 cross the town's road map. The 2020 census counted 3,143 residents. The place was laid out in 1831 for the newly formed county and named for John Alfred Cuthbert. Andrew College, founded here in 1854, brings a two-year liberal-arts campus into the same few-block orbit as the courthouse and downtown. The middle-of-town water tower sitting in the federal highway is one of those wonderfully odd local landmarks you remember.

ATTRHermann Luyken / CC0

The town's working map is compact: county offices and local businesses around the square, Andrew College a few blocks away, and Randolph County schools serving students from pre-school through high school. U.S. 27 runs north to Columbus and south toward Tallahassee, so Cuthbert is both a county-seat stop and a crossroads for southwest Georgia. Cuthbert's local scoop is a small courthouse town with an old college, an unusual water tower, and two big highways running right through its story.