Located in the southwestern part of the state, GA 195 makes an arc east of Americus through the major peach-growing part of the Peach State. On the north end is Andersonville, a significant historical site that is home to the Andersonville National Cemetary and the site of an 1864 Confederate prison. The southern end is in Leesburg.

GA 195 currently is 37 miles long. One of those miles is overlapped with U.S. 280/GA 30 between Leslie and DeSoto. The route is in Sumter and Lee Counties with the majority of the route in Sumter County. The route is also located west of the Flint River.

The original 1970's route of GA 195 was much longer than the route of today, extending 32 miles further than the current route, making the route 69 miles long. Yet another victim of the Great Decommissioning of 1982, GA 195 did not originally terminate in Andersonville on its northward trek. Also that year, GA 195 also lost its only banner route, GA 195 Connector, at the same time. A long and involved story, the route has a rather detailed history.

The original route of GA 195 consisted of two sections: the section south of U.S. 280 and the now decommissioned section north of Andersonville. When originally commissioned, both routes were entirely unpaved and mostly consisted of unimproved road. As GA 195 was not a major route, much of the route remained unpaved for a long period of time. However, the southern section seemed to draw the most interest, fully paved by 1955. Additionally, part of the northern section between Andersonville and GA 228 was paved by 1955 as well.

GA 195 did not fully connect at first on the north end, with the original northern end first commissioned as GA 128 Spur. GA 128 Spur drew traffic from GA 128 to the Potterville community, and it later became a disjointed segment of GA 195 and the only paved section on the north end. When the Potterville section became GA 195 in the early 1950's, it took until after 1960 for that section to be joined to the rest of the highway. Additionally, it took until 1959 for the route in Andersonville to connect directly to the portion south of U.S. 280 in Leslie. Interestingly enough, part of the 1959 takeover between Leslie and GA 27 was already paved, likely through the Rural Roads Authority. The rest remained unpaved.

As time progressed, the majority of the route was fully paved. In 1962, the remaining unpaved route included all but four sections: the portion from GA 90 in Ideal to GA 127, the portion of the route overlapping GA 127, the portion between GA 240 in Fountainville and GA 228 and one section south of Andersonville.

By 1964, a fifth section of highway was added as unpaved as the pavement was apparently removed on the northernmost section for replacement. By 1965, the GA 127 overlapped section was also paved, thus the total went down to three. In 1970, the Ideal section was complete and by 1980, the section south of Andersonville was paved. Of those sections paved after the early 1970's, those both were truncated to projected mileage in the late 1970's until paving was completed. Unfortunately, the route between GA 240 and GA 228 south of Fountainville never was paved nor was it ever a state highway again.

On October 1, 1982, GA 195 lost nearly half of its length. In all, however, this was not entirely surprising as GA 195 was fragmented along the route with several turns and overlaps with other routes that tied the route together. In all, this route followed the present-day list of county routes:

1. GA 49 to present day GA 228 [1.1 miles]
2. GA 228 to unpaved G.W. McClendon Road where GA 228 turns westward [approximately 2 miles]
3. Unpaved G.W. McClendon Road (Sumter C.R. 344) continuing as unpaved Macon C.R. 297.  Route includes a short paved section doglegging eastward along another county road [approximately 6 miles]
4. Part of present GA 240 north of GA 26 in Fountainville [2.9 miles]
5. Macon C.R. 299 extending north from GA 240 to Ideal [3.5 miles]
6. Part of GA 90 through the town of Ideal (Pop. 554) doglegging north [0.6 miles]
7. Macon C.R. 301 extending north of Ideal [4.5 miles]
8. Part of GA 127 doglegging west into Taylor County [1.7 miles] and finally
9. Taylor County 267 (Tommy Purvis Jr. Rd) north from GA 127 through Potterville to end at GA 128 three miles south of Reynolds [9.3 miles]

Former route of GA 195 and GA 195 Connector along with the unpaved portion south of Andersonville (1976 GDOT Map).	The northern portion of SR 195 as it remains today (1993 GDOT Map)

As the progress of paving GA 195 completely never came to fruition, more dust was stirred up north of there on GA 195 Connector, which was mentioned above as the only banner route of GA 195. Like the Fountainville section, GA 195 Connector was also never paved, and today is a continuation of Macon C.R. 107 between Old GA 195 and GA 240 in southwest Macon County.

Overall, the old northern portion of GA 195 was a messy road in many ways. Along with the complicated history, the entire alignment consisted of 3.4 miles overlapped with other routes with five more miles taken over by other routes that would have otherwise been left with "hanging ends" as a result of the turnback.

Also, the old route of GA 195 brought the highway into Macon and Taylor Counties, both counties served by far fewer routes than they once were. Lastly, GA 195 and GA 195 Connector were two of the last highways in Georgia to remain unpaved before the Macon County and Taylor County portions were finally given up.

Southern Terminus: U.S. 19/GA 3 in Leesburg
No photos available
Northern Terminus: GA 49 in Andersonville
Photos include end signage, directional assembly on northbound GA 49, first reassurance shield and junction assembly on southbound GA 49. All photos by J.T. Legg taken March 8, 2005.
Historic Northern Terminus: GA 128 three miles south of Reynolds
No photos available

Here are links related to sites and information on or near GA 195:

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