Hops: Notorious Georgia with Neely Young

Neely Young is a native of Cedartown, Georgia, a graduate of the University of Georgia and a proud journalist. In 1968, he joined his family-owned newspaper, The Valdosta Daily Times, worked in the photography department. After leaving Valdosta, he worked in various positions as both editor and publisher, for newspapers in Canton, Dalton, and Clayton County. In 1986, he became CEO of Morris Newspaper Corporation, which owned and ran forty newspapers in six states.

Three years later, he formed Southern Newspaper Company with Tom Cousins, building a chain of thirteen newspapers over nine years. In 1998, Southern Publishing was sold to Community Newspapers Holdings. The following year, Young, along with Cousins bought Georgia Trend Magazine, a publication with a circulation of fifty thousand that has become the states’s go-to source for business, political and development information. Young served as the magazine’s publisher and editor-in-chief for eighteen years until his retirement in 2017.

Young served as a curator for the Georgia Historical Society and wrote often about historical figures in his columns for Georgia Trend Magazine. In 2021, he wrote “Georgia Made” a book containing individual profiles of the most influential Georgians in the 20th Century. For writing the book, he was nominated for the Georgia Author of the Year. This second book about “Notorious Georgia,” is a series of profiles of of evil men, women and institutions and the people who brought them to justice.