Hamburg State Park, established in 1968, is northeast of Sandersville. The park encompasses 741 acres with a 225 acre lake. Visitors here can enjoy camping, fishing, picnicking, and hiking. In the park sits a museum housing early era milling equipment as well as a water-driven gin and a twentieth century grist mill that is still in operation.
Prior to this area becoming a state park, Richard Warthen, founder of the Warthen community, set up a grist mill, a woolen mill, and a cotton gin at this location in 1784. He named the location of these implements “Hamburg” after Hamburg, South Carolina in the hopes that his mills would become as prosperous as though in South Carolina.
