Sugar Hill was the sight of significant iron ore mining in the early twentieth century and the final stop on the Iron Belt Railroad. One of the largest deposits of iron ore were found at Sugar Hill in the Pine Log Mountains and mined by the Georgia Iron and Coal Company beginning in 1902. Owned by Atlanta businessman and investor Joel Hurt, mining continued through the 1940’s. Much of the work at Sugar Hill was done by low cost convict labor housed at a labor camp on site. Prisoner abuses were reported, but seldom received the attention warranted. These types of camps were abolished in 1943 when Georgia Governor Ellis Arnall succumbed to national attention. Sugar Hill is located towards the northern end of the Pine Log Mountains off East Valley Road. The area is gated and managed by the Georgia Department of Natural Resources.
Source: History of Bartow County, Georgia by Lucy Josephine Cunyus.