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New Orleans is the largest city in the state of Louisiana,
United States of America. It is an industrial and distribution
center, a major seaport, and known for its rich cultural heritage,
especially its music and cuisine. The city is on the banks
of the Mississippi River about 100 miles upriver from the
Gulf of Mexico at 30.07°N, 89.93°W. As of the 2000
census, the population of the city is 484,674. This figure
does not include the suburbs in neighboring Jefferson Parish,
Saint Bernard and other nearby communities; the Greater New
Orleans Metropolitan Area is estimated to have a population
of about 1 million. By law and government, the city of New
Orleans and the parish of Orleans are one and the same.
History
Colonial Era
New Orleans was founded by the French under the direction
of Jean Baptiste Lemoyne, Sieur de Bienville, in 1718 and
became the capital of French Louisiana in 1722. In 1763 the
colony was ceded to the Spanish Empire as a secret provision
of the Treaty of Fontainebleau, but no Spanish governor came
to take control until 1766. Some of the early French settlers
were never quite happy with Spanish rule, and repeatedly petitioned
to be returned to French control. A fire destroyed 856 buildings
in the city on March 21, 1788, and another destroyed 212 buildings
in December of 1794; after this brick replaced wood as the
main building material. The population of New Orleans also
suffered from epidemics of Yellow Fever, Malaria, and Smallpox,
which would periodically return throughout the 19th century
until the successful suppression of the city's final outbreak
of Yellow Fever in 1905. In 1795 Spain granted the United
States "Right of Deposit" in New Orleans, allowing
Americans to use the city's port facilities. Louisiana reverted
to French control in 1801 after Napoleon's conquest of Spain,
but in 1803 Napoleon sold Louisiana (which at the time also
included the territory which are now several other states)
to the United States in the Louisiana Purchase (See). At this
time the city of New Orleans had a population of about 10,000
people.
New Orleans in the 19th Century.
From early days it was noted for its cosmopolitan polyglot
population and mixture of cultures. The city grew rapidly,
with influxes of both Americans and French and Creole French
(many of the latter fleeing from the revolution in Haiti).
During the War of 1812 the British sent a force to try to
conquer the city, but they were defeated by the forces led
by Andrew Jackson some miles down river from the city at Chalmette,
Louisiana on January 8, 1815 (commonly known as the Battle
of New Orleans).
New Orleans was the capital of the state of Louisiana until
1849, then again from 1865 to 1880. In the early 19th century
it became the United States' largest city away from the Atlantic
seaboard, as well as the largest in the South. As a principal
port it had a leading role in the slave trade, while at the
same time having North America's largest community of free
persons of color. Early in the American Civil War it was captured
by the Union without a battle, and hence was spared the destruction
suffered by many other cities of the American South. It retains
a historical flavor with a wealth of 19th century structures
far beyond the early colonial city boundaries of the French
Quarter. The city hosted the 1884 World's Fair, called the
World Cotton Centennial. An important attraction in the late
19th and early 20th centuries was the famous red light district
called Storyville.
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the 20th Century >1, 2
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