Newton Tales is an ongoing series exploring the rich history of Newton County.

COVINGTON, Ga. — It was 1988 and Susette Monk was considering running for the soon-vacant District 3 seat on the Newton County Board of Commissioners.

The Covington businesswoman recalled a former commissioner coming to her home and telling her what he thought of her chances for election, Monk said.

"He said, 'They'll never elect a single woman, especially one with a child,'" Monk said.

She also was a Republican in a Democrat-dominated county facing local longtime political, civic and recreation leader B.C. Crowell of Porterdale in the General Election. 

"Everybody thought it was a lost cause," Monk said.

But a friend helped her knock on hundreds of doors during the campaign in areas like Oxford and she eked out a victory over Crowell, she said. 

Her win allowed Monk to become the first woman and first Republican to be elected to the Newton County Board of Commissioners. 

She said the county had about 40,000 residents in 1988 — almost two-thirds smaller than today's population. The District 3 seat had been held by one man, Bob Bates, for almost two decades and Monk recalled the Board being a "good ol' boy network" of commissioners.

She said she believed she brought a "female touch" to issues with which the Board dealt. 

"We needed a representative for that vote," Monk said, in reference to female voters.

Some members were not "thrilled" with spending on such things as an animal control department or a Court-Appointed Special Advocate (CASA) program that advocated for children caught in the court system, she said.

"We had our differences .. our knock-down, drag-outs," Monk said.

But she also said the board on which she served, which included such civic leaders as Harold Cobb and Chairman Roy Varner, boasted people genuinely concerned about their community.

Monk served one term before leaving the District 3 seat and making an unsuccessful bid for the county chairman job. She also ran for state House of Representatives and other positions, including her old District 3 seat in 2016.

Four years after Monk left office, the second female commissioner, Leanne Long, won a special election in 1996 for the District 2 seat when Ester Fleming ran for county chairman. 

Long also recalled the Board being a "boy's club." She recalled constituents calling her home during her two years on the Board and being content to talk to her husband rather than Long.

The DeKalb native had moved to Newton County in 1990. She began her service on the Board in 1997 when District 2 in western Newton was still primarily rural, but the county's population was rapidly growing after a long period of little population growth. 

Homebuilders were meeting the increasing demand for housing by rapidly building homes that Long and others believed could have been larger and of higher quality. 

"The western end was being pounded," Long said.

"I was firm about raising the square footage," she said. "The citizens wanted it."

But she said others on the Board favored fewer constraints on the housing market and she was outvoted.

A decade later, the widow of former chairman Davis Morgan, Kathy Morgan, won election as Newton County's first female county chairman.

Kathy Morgan had been a major part of the family's construction business, MOPAC Inc., and, later, was in the banking business when her husband served as chairman from 1992-2000.

By the time Mrs. Morgan was elected in 2008, she said she had worked in a male-dominated business world for years. 

"It was not an issue I had ever considered," she said.

She said she "did notice there were situations where people wanted to patronize me" and she would ask her male county manager, John Middleton, to join in the discussion.

"Once they got to know me, the issue never came up," she said.

She said older men typically had a harder time dealing with a woman — though she often knew more about road construction than her male counterparts because of her work in the family business.

However, the timing of her election and her term of office from 2009-2013 were not favorable for her administration or the county. The Great Recession severely affected Newton's residential construction-dominated economy. 

"Real estate hit us greatly," Morgan recalled.

The county government was forced to cut about 30% of its General Fund as tax revenues plummeted within months in 2009. County leaders then had to make painful cuts and laid off 70 employees, Morgan said.

Davis said her background in the private sector gave her the experience needed to deal with such reductions but it was difficult, nonetheless, she said.

"Every time I had to do it, it was an individual I knew and cared about," she said.

The activity around Covington's square also little resembled the tourism-heavy traffic of today, she said. 

But Warner Brothers Studios approached the local governments around this time and began using the downtown area as locations for its new show, "Vampire Diaries."

Baxter Pharmaceuticals also contacted county leaders around this time with plans for what became the first major industry to locate in Stanton Springs industrial park, she said. It now operates as Takeda Pharmaceuticals.

Morgan now serves as the administrator of the Highway 278 Community Improvement District, which seeks to improve the economic condition for residents and businesses along U.S. Hwy. 278 in Covington.

U.S. Rep. Hank Johnson, D-Stonecrest, recently honored her and eight other area women with "Trailblazer” awards in recognition of their "pioneering careers and service to the greater community." 

Johnson honored Morgan for being the first and only woman elected chairman of the Newton County Board of Commissioners.