How do I create a location category before the county existed in Georgia?

Question

There are a number of people that lived in Ebenezer Georgia before the county of Effingham was created.  I don't want to label the profile with Effingham County, just as I wouldn't add USA to a profile before the revolutionary war.  Do I just use Georgia or since Ebenezer was an important settlement in pre-colonial Georgia should there be a separate location category?

Answer 1

Thanks Ellen.  I found a category that works well -- St. Matthews Parish, Georgia -- which is in the Province of Georgia and includes Ebenezer.  Since that parish actually encompasses the settlement (and was combined with St. Phillips parish to make Effingham county in 1777), I chose that category over creating Ebenezer as a separate entity, since there are settlers that didn't actually live in Ebenezer, just worshipped at the church. Thank you very much for the Massachusetts example.  That was really informative.

Answer 2

Create the category as Ebenezer, Georgia. A category can have multiple parents. In this case, both Georgia and the county category seem appropriate as parents (Georgia because that was the parent entity when the community was active and the county because that's where it is geographically).

See Category: Little Compton, Massachusetts for one indication of how a place with a complicated history could be handled.