Marshall Forest is a three hundred eleven-acre protected forest in Floyd County near Rome, one of the few remaining old-growth forests in northwest Georgia and often cited as the only virgin forest within any United States city limits. Once part of the Cherokee Nation, it was bought by the Marshall family in 1880 and remained with them until Maclean Marshall helped secure its designation as Georgia’s first Natural National Landmark in 1966. Although later additions expanded the preserve, only about seventy-five to one hundred acres of the original forest remain uncut. The forest is prized for its exceptional biodiversity, including hundreds of plant species and important habitat for the endangered large-flowered skullcap.