Hurricane Shoals Park near Maysville, Georgia, preserves exposed granite shoals along the North Oconee River in a landscape shaped by Native use, early settlement, industry, and preservation. Known earlier as Yamtrahoochee or Hurricane Shoals, it had been a Creek and Cherokee camping ground before settlers established a community here in the 1780s with a fort, schoolhouse, grist mill, and Baptist church. Its notable covered bridge, built in 1872, spans 127 feet across the river. A hydroelectric plant built in 1925 briefly served Maysville before abandonment. Preservation efforts beginning in 1962 led to its development as a public recreational and historic site, opened in 1978.