Booth Western Museum

You  don’t have to be a fan of Gene Autry or Roy Rogers to enjoy the Booth Western  Art Museum in  Cartersville, Georgia. Sure, cowboys and Indians are the main attraction here. But while the museum’s main gallery focuses on the American West, other permanent  exhibits of Civil War art, presidential portraits and letters, and cinematic  memorabilia make this museum a treasure of Americana. In  the American West gallery, you might be surprised to find more than pictures of  tumbleweeds and cowboys; this Western Art collection includes awe-inspiring  photography, lifelike sculptures, a real 1864 stagecoach and of course, plenty  of action scenes. Kids  who love the cowboy life should saddle up in the Sagebrush Ranch, a play area where  they learn to blend creative expression with the Old West fun. If  you time your visit for October or March, you can experience the Booth Museum’s  annual cowboy festivals (the fall festival re-creates the infamous gunfight at  the O.K. Corral with Wyatt Earp and Georgia native “Doc” Holliday), with  schedules full of cowboy songs, art appreciation and chuck-wagon cooking.

Long  before there were cowboys, American Indians built a community at the Etowah Indian  Mounds, a  Georgia historic site and National Register landmark. Intact mounds are all  that’s left of the civilization that began around the year 1000. What are the  mysterious mounds exactly? American Indians probably used them for burials and  as foundations for temples. But the best way to envision early American life is  to climb the mound yourself and imagine the rituals that took place there. For  a quick afternoon bite, sample the homemade, natural soups and sandwiches at  Swheat (pronounced “sweet”) Market Deli in the historic downtown area. The  sweet potato/black bean and the white bean/rosemary soup specials are among the  bestsellers, but organic choices and vegetarian and vegan specialties are part  of the menu every day.