One of Georgia’s seven natural wonders, Okefenokee Swamp has inspired everything from comic strips to rides at Six Flags Over Georgia and has long been one of the state’s leading tourist attractions, but on Feb. 8, the 428,000-acre blackwater wetland will finally get its dues at Georgia’s Capitol as Gov. Brian Kemp and legislators proclaim the date as Okefenokee Swamp Day in Georgia.

“We applaud Georgia’s leaders for recognizing the significance of the Okefenokee Swamp to the communities surrounding it, our state, nation and world,” said Kim Bednarek, director of Okefenokee Swamp Park, a private non-profit park catering to swamp visitors near Waycross. “The swamp is the wild heart of Georgia and it’s right to celebrate this natural wonder.”

The proclamation recognizes the swamp as the largest blackwater wetland in North America, a Wetland of International Importance and a potential candidate for UNESCO World Heritage Site designation.

It further acknowledges the swamp’s impact on surrounding communities like Fargo, Folkston and Waycross which see an annual $64.7 million economic impact from swamp-based tourism along with the creation of some 750 swamp-related jobs. Further, the National Wildlife Refuge records more than 650,000 annual visits to the swamp.

Okefenokee Swamp Park, Stephen C. Foster State Park and the Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge have recently partnered with Valdosta State University to develop a comprehensive marketing strategy for swamp-based tourism.

It’s an effort to rejuvenate swamp tourism which declined after the completion of I-95 on the Georgia coast in the 1970s. The new interstate took Florida-bound tourists off U.S. 1 which passes through Waycross and Folkston, two of the primary gateways to the swamp.

During Okefenokee Swamp Day at the capital, representatives from Okefenokee Swamp Park, Stephen C. Foster State Park, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, Okefenokee Adventures and other swamp-related businesses will be present to talk with legislators about the importance of the swamp.

Georgia’s General Assembly, itself, has an interesting and more than century-old relationship with the swamp. In the 1800s, the state-owned swamp was seen as wasteland that could be of use only after being drained. As such, in 1866, the General Assembly agreed to designate any funds from the sale of swamp property for use by the state home for orphans.

In 1889, the General Assembly agreed to sell the swamp to the Suwannee Canal Company for $63,101, or about 28 cents an acre. The company proposed draining the swamp, building an Atlantic-to-Gulf of Mexico water passage, accessing the swamp’s vast timber reserves and turning the wetlands into productive agricultural land. Led by company president Henry Jackson, the attempt failed and soon became known as Jackson’s Folly.

A little more than a century after selling the swamp, in 1992 the General Assembly recognized one of the swamp’s own when legislators agreed to designate Pogo ‘Possum as the official “State ‘Possum.” Pogo, a comic strip character, was created by cartoonist Walt Kelly whose Pogo strip was nationally syndicated from 1948 to 1975.

Set in the Okefenokee Swamp, it featured a host of animal characters and poked fun at American culture and politics. On Earth Day 1971, the strip featured Pogo commenting on a polluted landscape: “We have met the enemy and he is us.”

“Today, a trip in the Okefenokee Swamp is among the wildest and most remote adventures possible in Georgia,” said Rena Peck, Executive Director of Georgia River Network which helped organize Okefenokee Swamp Day at the capitol. “The swamp’s natural beauty and wildness inspired Walt Kelly to create Pogo and it still inspires the hundreds of thousands who visit it today. It’s a state treasure worthy of celebration and preservation.”