While other cities may try to lay claim to the moniker, there is only one official “Hollywood of the South”. 

And it’s right here in Newton County.

According to Ron Carter with the Covington-Newton Chamber of Commerce, the City of Covington first used the term in 1996 and made it official by registering it in 2010.

In 2012, the city officially unveiled its “Walk of Stars”. The project was the culmination of a 1996 vision of two local women to highlight movies and television shows filmed on Covington’s Historic Square.

Carter said in 2017 40,819 people passed through the visitor’s center adjacent to the Chamber of Commerce in downtown Covington, just a few steps from the Square. Of those, he said, 80 to 85 percent came to visit the “Hollywood of the South”.

Though the area received its first film credit with 1954’s “A Man Called Peter” and the 1970s and 80s saw a smattering of projects, it wasn’t until the 1990s that the area became a hot bed for Hollywood producers looking for picturesque locales away from California and New York. 

And the “Hollywood of the South” was born.