CORNELIA, Ga. – For years, cotton was king throughout Georgia. But, by the 1920s, apples were becoming an important crop in parts of the state, including Cornelia. Because of the crop diversification, Habersham County skirted the devastating effects of the boll weevil’s destruction of the cotton crop. So, in 1925, Southern Railway donated to the city a monument dedicated to the fruit that helped save their community. The seven-foot-tall, 5,200-pound apple statue was molded in