Jonesboro

City and joint seat (with Lake City) of Craighead County, in northeastern Arkansas; population (1990) 46,500. Jonesboro is situated on Crowley's Ridge in the Mississippi Valley 105 km/65 mi northwest of Memphis, Tennessee.

A sawmilling town until 1910, Jonesboro later became an agricultural processing centre, handling rice, soybeans, and cotton. Manufactured goods from here include electric motors, shoes, machinery, and plumbing fixtures. It is the site of Arkansas State University (founded 1909).

Jonesboro

City and seat of Clayton County, northern Georgia, 32 km/20 mi south of downtown Atlanta; population (1990) 3,600.

During the Civil War, the commercial and manufacturing centre of Jonesboro was seized by Union forces on 1 September, 1864. This action succeeded in cutting off Atlanta's final outside rail connection and forced the Confederates to abandon the city to General Sherman. In Margaret Mitchell's famous Civil War novel Gone with the Wind (1936), Jonesboro appears under the fictional name of Tara.