Speaker Murphy Exhibit Opens

The Irvine Sullivan Ingram Library at the University of West Georgia and the Georgia Humanities Council opened the exhibit, “Speaker Tom Murphy: Steady Leadership in Changing Times,” with guest Georgia House Speaker Glenn Richardson this week at the Dallas branch of the Paulding County Public Library. The exhibit is free and the community is invited to attend.

The exhibit will be on display throughout the month of June. The project is supported by the Georgia Humanities Council, the National Endowment for the Humanities and through appropriations from the Georgia General Assembly.

This summer, the Murphy exhibit will travel to various public libraries in the West Georgia Regional Library System before returning to UWG in November. Additional exhibit locations include the Heard County Public Library in Franklin in July, which will coordinate the exhibit with the community’s Chattahoochee Independence Day celebration.

In the months of August and September the exhibit will be at the William P. Sewell Public Library in Bremen and then travel to the Douglas County Public Library in Douglasville in October.

Murphy, who passed away in 2007, was the 69th Speaker of the House of Representatives. Born in Haralson County, Murphy graduated from Bremen High School and North Georgia College and received his law degree from the University of Georgia. Murphy was also a Navy veteran of World War II who saw combat action in the Pacific. He served as Speaker longer than anyone else in Georgia’s history and was the longest tenured Speaker in the United States when he left office.

Ingram Library’s proposed renovation includes the installation of a permanent exhibit of a replica of Speaker Murphy’s office. The development of the panel exhibit will allow the university to begin shaping a permanent exhibit to support the future office.

The Ingram Library developed the exhibit with the assistance of the Department of History, the Center for Public History and the Georgia Political Heritage Project. All are located on the UWG campus.

The Dallas branch in Paulding is located at 1010 E. Memorial Dr., Dallas. For more information, call 678-839-6350.