History of Louisville, Kentucky - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The history
History
History is the discovery, collection, organization, and presentation of information about past events. History can also mean the period of time after writing was invented. Scholars who write about history are called historians...

of Louisville, Kentucky
Louisville, Kentucky
Louisville is the largest city in the U.S. state of Kentucky, and the county seat of Jefferson County. Since 2003, the city's borders have been coterminous with those of the county because of a city-county merger. The city's population at the 2010 census was 741,096...

spans hundreds of years, with thousands of years of human habitation. The area's geography

Geography of Louisville, Kentucky

Louisville is a city in Jefferson County, Kentucky. It is located at the Falls of the Ohio River.Louisville is located at . According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Louisville Metro has a total area of 1,032 km²...

and location on the Ohio River attracted people from the earliest times. The city is located at the Falls of the Ohio River

Falls of the Ohio National Wildlife Conservation Area

The Falls of the Ohio National Wildlife Conservation Area is a national, bi-state area on the Ohio River near Louisville, Kentucky in the United States, administered by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Federal status was awarded in 1981.- Overview :...

. The rapids created a barrier to river travel, and settlements grew up at this pausing point.

Louisville has been the site of many important innovations through history. Notable residents have included inventor Thomas Edison

Thomas Edison

Thomas Alva Edison was an American inventor and businessman. He developed many devices that greatly influenced life around the world, including the phonograph, the motion picture camera, and a long-lasting, practical electric light bulb. In addition, he created the world’s first industrial...

, U.S. Supreme Court

Supreme Court of the United States

The Supreme Court of the United States is the highest court in the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all state and federal courts, and original jurisdiction over a small range of cases...

Justice Louis Brandeis

Louis Brandeis

Louis Dembitz Brandeis ; November 13, 1856 – October 5, 1941) was an Associate Justice on the Supreme Court of the United States from 1916 to 1939.He was born in Louisville, Kentucky, to Jewish immigrant parents who raised him in a secular mode...

, boxing

Boxing

Boxing, also called pugilism, is a combat sport in which two people fight each other using their fists. Boxing is supervised by a referee over a series of between one to three minute intervals called rounds...

legend Muhammad Ali

Muhammad Ali

Muhammad Ali is an American former professional boxer, philanthropist and social activist...

, newscaster Diane Sawyer

Diane Sawyer

Lila Diane Sawyer is the current anchor of ABC News' flagship program, ABC World News. Previously, Sawyer had been co-anchor of ABC Newss morning news program, Good Morning America ....

, actor Tom Cruise

Tom Cruise

Thomas Cruise Mapother IV , better known as Tom Cruise, is an American film actor and producer. He has been nominated for three Academy Awards and he has won three Golden Globe Awards....

, the Speed family (including U.S. Attorney General

United States Attorney General

The United States Attorney General is the head of the United States Department of Justice concerned with legal affairs and is the chief law enforcement officer of the United States government. The attorney general is considered to be the chief lawyer of the U.S. government...

James Speed

James Speed was an American lawyer, politician and professor. In 1864, he was appointed by Abraham Lincoln to be the United States' Attorney General. He previously served in the Kentucky Legislature, and in local political office.Speed was born in Jefferson County, Kentucky, to Judge John Speed...

and Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...

's close friend Joshua Fry Speed

Joshua Fry Speed

Joshua Fry Speed was a close friend of Abraham Lincoln from his days in Springfield, Illinois, where Speed was a partner in a general store...

), the Bingham family, industrialist/politician James Guthrie, U.S. Senate Minority Leader

Party leaders of the United States Senate

The Senate Majority and Minority Leaders are two United States Senators who are elected by the party conferences that hold the majority and the minority respectively. These leaders serve as the chief Senate spokespeople for their parties and manage and schedule the legislative and executive...

Mitch McConnell

Addison Mitchell "Mitch" McConnell, Jr. is the senior United States Senator from Kentucky and the Republican Minority Leader.- Early life, education, and military service :...

and writers Hunter S. Thompson

Hunter S. Thompson

Hunter Stockton Thompson was an American journalist and author who wrote The Rum Diary , Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72 .He is credited as the creator of Gonzo journalism, a style of reporting where reporters involve themselves in the action to...

and Sue Grafton

Sue Grafton

Sue Taylor Grafton is a contemporary American author of detective novels. She is best known as the author of the 'alphabet series' featuring private investigator Kinsey Millhone in the fictional city of Santa Teresa, California. The daughter of detective novelist C. W...

.

Notable events occurring in the city include the largest installation to date (in 1883)

Southern Exposition

The Southern Exposition was a five-year series of World's Fairs held in the city of Louisville, Kentucky from 1883 to 1887 in what is now Louisville's Old Louisville neighborhood. The exposition, held for 100 days each year on immediately south of Central Park, which is now the St....

and first large space lighted by Edison's light bulb

Incandescent light bulb

The incandescent light bulb, incandescent lamp or incandescent light globe makes light by heating a metal filament wire to a high temperature until it glows. The hot filament is protected from air by a glass bulb that is filled with inert gas or evacuated. In a halogen lamp, a chemical process...

and the first library in the South open to African American

African American

African Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have at least partial ancestry from any of the native populations of Sub-Saharan Africa and are the direct descendants of enslaved Africans within the boundaries of the present United States...

s. Medical advances included the first human hand transplant in the United States, the first self-contained artificial heart

Artificial heart

An artificial heart is a mechanical device that replaces the heart. Artificial hearts are typically used in order to bridge the time to heart transplantation, or to permanently replace the heart in case transplantation is impossible...

transplant, and development of the first cervical cancer vaccine

Gardasil

Gardasil , also known as Gardisil or Silgard, is a vaccine for use in the prevention of certain types of human papillomavirus , specifically HPV types 6, 11, 16 and 18. HPV types 16 and 18 cause an estimated 70% of cervical cancers, and are responsible for most HPV-induced anal, vulvar, vaginal,...

Pre-Anglo-American settlement history (pre-1778)

There was a continuous human presence in the area that became Louisville from at least 1,000 BCE until roughly 1650 CE

Common Era

Common Era ,abbreviated as CE, is an alternative designation for the calendar era originally introduced by Dionysius Exiguus in the 6th century, traditionally identified with Anno Domini .Dates before the year 1 CE are indicated by the usage of BCE, short for Before the Common Era Common Era...

. Archeologists have identified several late and one early Archaic sites in Jefferson County's wetlands. One of the most extensive finds was at McNeeley Lake Cave; many others were found around the Louisville International Airport

Louisville International Airport

Louisville International Airport is a joint civil-military public airport centrally located in the city of Louisville in Jefferson County, Kentucky, USA. The airport covers 1,200 acres and has three runways. Its IATA airport code SDF is based on the airport's former name, Standiford Field...

area. People of the Adena culture

Adena culture

The Adena culture was a Pre-Columbian Native American culture that existed from 1000 to 200 BC, in a time known as the early Woodland Period. The Adena culture refers to what were probably a number of related Native American societies sharing a burial complex and ceremonial system...

and the Hopewell tradition that followed it lived in the area, with hunting villages along Mill Creek and a large village near what became Zorn Avenue, on bluffs overlooking the Ohio River. Archeologists have found 30 Jefferson County sites associated with the Fort Ancient

Fort Ancient

Fort Ancient is a name for a Native American culture that flourished from 1000-1750 CE among a people who predominantly inhabited land along the Ohio River in areas of modern-day Southern Ohio, Northern Kentucky, Southeastern Indiana and Western West Virginia. They were a maize based agricultural...

and Mississippian culture

Mississippian culture

The Mississippian culture was a mound-building Native American culture that flourished in what is now the Midwestern, Eastern, and Southeastern United States from approximately 800 CE to 1500 CE, varying regionally....

s, which were active from 1,000 CE until about 1650. The Louisville area was on the eastern border of the Mississippian culture, in which regional chiefdom

Chiefdom

A chiefdom is a political economy that organizes regional populations through a hierarchy of the chief.In anthropological theory, one model of human social development rooted in ideas of cultural evolution describes a chiefdom as a form of social organization more complex than a tribe or a band...

s built villages and cities with extensive earthwork mounds

Earthworks (archaeology)

In archaeology, earthwork is a general term to describe artificial changes in land level. Earthworks are often known colloquially as 'lumps and bumps'. Earthworks can themselves be archaeological features or they can show features beneath the surface...

.

When European and English explorers and settlers began entering Kentucky in the mid-18th century, there were no permanent Native American settlements in the region. The country was used as hunting grounds by Shawnee

Shawnee

The Shawnee, Shaawanwaki, Shaawanooki and Shaawanowi lenaweeki, are an Algonquian-speaking people native to North America. Historically they inhabited the areas of Ohio, Virginia, West Virginia, Western Maryland, Kentucky, Indiana, and Pennsylvania...

s from the north and Cherokee

Cherokee

The Cherokee are a Native American people historically settled in the Southeastern United States . Linguistically, they are part of the Iroquoian language family...

s from the south.

The first European to visit the area was the French

French people

The French are a nation that share a common French culture and speak the French language as a mother tongue. Historically, the French population are descended from peoples of Celtic, Latin and Germanic origin, and are today a mixture of several ethnic groups...

explorer, René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle

René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle

René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle, or Robert de LaSalle was a French explorer. He explored the Great Lakes region of the United States and Canada, the Mississippi River, and the Gulf of Mexico...

in 1669. He explored areas of the Mississippi

Mississippi River

The Mississippi River is the largest river system in North America. Flowing entirely in the United States, this river rises in western Minnesota and meanders slowly southwards for to the Mississippi River Delta at the Gulf of Mexico. With its many tributaries, the Mississippi's watershed drains...

and Ohio

Ohio River

The Ohio River is the largest tributary, by volume, of the Mississippi River. At the confluence, the Ohio is even bigger than the Mississippi and, thus, is hydrologically the main stream of the whole river system, including the Allegheny River further upstream...

river valleys

Valley

In geology, a valley or dale is a depression with predominant extent in one direction. A very deep river valley may be called a canyon or gorge.The terms U-shaped and V-shaped are descriptive terms of geography to characterize the form of valleys...

from the Gulf of Mexico

Gulf of Mexico

The Gulf of Mexico is a partially landlocked ocean basin largely surrounded by the North American continent and the island of Cuba. It is bounded on the northeast, north and northwest by the Gulf Coast of the United States, on the southwest and south by Mexico, and on the southeast by Cuba. In...

up to modern-day Canada

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

, claiming much of this land for France.

In 1751, the English

English people

The English are a nation and ethnic group native to England, who speak English. The English identity is of early mediaeval origin, when they were known in Old English as the Anglecynn. England is now a country of the United Kingdom, and the majority of English people in England are British Citizens...

colonist Christopher Gist

Christopher Gist

Christopher Gist was an accomplished American explorer, surveyor and frontiersman. He was one of the first white explorers of the Ohio Country . He is credited with providing the first detailed description of the Ohio Country to Great Britain and her colonists...

explored areas along the Ohio River. Following its defeat in the French and Indian War

French and Indian War

The French and Indian War is the common American name for the war between Great Britain and France in North America from 1754 to 1763. In 1756, the war erupted into the world-wide conflict known as the Seven Years' War and thus came to be regarded as the North American theater of that war...

(part of the Seven Years War in Europe), France relinquished control of the area of Kentucky to England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

.

In 1769, colonist Daniel Boone

Daniel Boone

Daniel Boone was an American pioneer, explorer, and frontiersman whose frontier exploits mad']'e him one of the first folk heroes of the United States. Boone is most famous for his exploration and settlement of what is now the Commonwealth of Kentucky, which was then beyond the western borders of...

created a trail from North Carolina

North Carolina

North Carolina is a state located in the southeastern United States. The state borders South Carolina and Georgia to the south, Tennessee to the west and Virginia to the north. North Carolina contains 100 counties. Its capital is Raleigh, and its largest city is Charlotte...

to Tennessee

Tennessee

Tennessee is a U.S. state located in the Southeastern United States. It has a population of 6,346,105, making it the nation's 17th-largest state by population, and covers , making it the 36th-largest by total land area...

. He spent the next two years exploring Kentucky. In 1773, Captain Thomas Bullitt

Thomas Bullitt

Thomas Bullitt was an United States soldier and pioneer from Prince William County, Virginia.Thomas was born to Benjamin and Sarah Bullitt abut 1734 in Prince William County of Virginia. He became active in the militia when young, and became interested in western exploration and development...

led the first exploring party into Jefferson County

Jefferson County, Kentucky

As of the census of 2000, there were 693,604 people, 287,012 households, and 183,113 families residing in the county. The population density was . There were 305,835 housing units at an average density of...

, surveying land on behalf of Virginians who had been awarded land grant

Land grant

A land grant is a gift of real estate – land or its privileges – made by a government or other authority as a reward for services to an individual, especially in return for military service...

s for service in the French and Indian War

French and Indian War

. In 1774, James Harrod

James Harrod

James Harrod was a pioneer, soldier, and hunter who helped explore and settle the area west of the Allegheny Mountains. Little is known about Harrod's early life, including the exact date of his birth. He was possibly underage when he served in the French and Indian War, and later participated in...

began constructing Fort Harrod in Kentucky. However, battles with the native American tribes established in the area forced these new settlers to retreat. They returned the following year, as Daniel Boone built the Wilderness Road

Wilderness Road

The Wilderness Road was the principal route used by settlers for more than fifty years to reach Kentucky from the East. In 1775, Daniel Boone blazed a trail for the Transylvania Company from Fort Chiswell in Virginia through the Cumberland Gap into central Kentucky. It was later lengthened,...

and established Fort Boonesborough at the site near Boonesborough, Kentucky

Boonesborough, Kentucky

Boonesborough is an unincorporated community in Madison County, Kentucky, United States. It lies in the central part of the state along the Kentucky River. Boonesborough is part of the Richmond–Berea Micropolitan Statistical Area....

. The Native Americans allocated a tract of land between the Ohio River and the Cumberland River

Cumberland River

The Cumberland River is a waterway in the Southern United States. It is long. It starts in Harlan County in far southeastern Kentucky between Pine and Cumberland mountains, flows through southern Kentucky, crosses into northern Tennessee, and then curves back up into western Kentucky before...

for the Transylvania Land Company. In 1776, the colony of Virginia

Virginia

The Commonwealth of Virginia , is a U.S. state on the Atlantic Coast of the Southern United States. Virginia is nicknamed the "Old Dominion" and sometimes the "Mother of Presidents" after the eight U.S. presidents born there...

declared the Transylvania Land Company illegal and created the county of Kentucky in Virginia from the land involved.

Foundation and early settlement (1778–1803)

Col. George Rogers Clark

George Rogers Clark

George Rogers Clark was a soldier from Virginia and the highest ranking American military officer on the northwestern frontier during the American Revolutionary War. He served as leader of the Kentucky militia throughout much of the war...

made the first Anglo-American settlement in the vicinity of modern-day Louisville in 1778, during the American Revolutionary War

American Revolutionary War

The American Revolutionary War , the American War of Independence, or simply the Revolutionary War, began as a war between the Kingdom of Great Britain and thirteen British colonies in North America, and ended in a global war between several European great powers.The war was the result of the...

. He was conducting a campaign against the British

Kingdom of Great Britain

The former Kingdom of Great Britain, sometimes described as the 'United Kingdom of Great Britain', That the Two Kingdoms of Scotland and England, shall upon the 1st May next ensuing the date hereof, and forever after, be United into One Kingdom by the Name of GREAT BRITAIN. was a sovereign...

in areas north of the Ohio River, then called the Illinois Country

Illinois Country

The Illinois Country , also known as Upper Louisiana, was a region in what is now the Midwestern United States that was explored and settled by the French during the 17th and 18th centuries. The terms referred to the entire Upper Mississippi River watershed, though settlement was concentrated in...

. Clark organized a group of 150 soldiers, known as the Illinois Regiment, after heavy recruiting in Virginia

Virginia

and Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania

The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is a U.S. state that is located in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The state borders Delaware and Maryland to the south, West Virginia to the southwest, Ohio to the west, New York and Ontario, Canada, to the north, and New Jersey to...

. On May 12, they set out from Redstone, today's Brownsville, Pennsylvania

Brownsville, Pennsylvania

Brownsville is a borough in Fayette County, Pennsylvania, United States, officially founded in 1785 located 35 miles south of Pittsburgh along the Monongahela River...

, taking along 80 civilians who hoped to claim fertile farmland and start a new settlement in Kentucky. They arrived at the Falls of the Ohio

Falls of the Ohio National Wildlife Conservation Area

on May 27. It was a location Clark thought ideal for a communication post. The settlers helped Clark conceal the true reason for his presence in the area.

The regiment helped the civilians establish a settlement on what came to be called Corn Island

Corn Island (Kentucky)

Corn Island is a now-vanished island in the Ohio River, at head of the Falls of the Ohio, just north of Louisville, Kentucky.-Geography:Estimates of the size of Corn Island vary with time as it gradually was eroded and became submerged. A 1780 survey listed its size at...

, clearing land and building cabins and a springhouse. On June 24, Clark took his soldiers and left to begin their military campaign

Military campaign

In the military sciences, the term military campaign applies to large scale, long duration, significant military strategy plan incorporating a series of inter-related military operations or battles forming a distinct part of a larger conflict often called a war...

. A year later, at the request of Clark, the settlers began crossing the river and established the first permanent settlement. By April they called it "Louisville", in honor of King Louis XVI of France

Louis XVI of France

Louis XVI was a Bourbon monarch who ruled as King of France and Navarre until 1791, and then as King of the French from 1791 to 1792, before being executed in 1793....

, whose government and soldiers aided colonists in the Revolutionary War

American Revolutionary War

. Today, George Rogers Clark is recognized as the European-American founder of Louisville, and many landmarks are named after him.

During its earliest history, the colony of Louisville and the surrounding areas suffered from Indian attacks, as Native Americans tried to push out the encroaching colonists. As the Revolutionary War was still being waged, all early residents lived within forts, as suggested by the earliest government of Kentucky County, Virginia

Kentucky County, Virginia

Kentucky County was formed by the Commonwealth of Virginia by dividing Fincastle County into three new counties: Kentucky, Washington, and Montgomery, effective December 31, 1776. Four years later Kentucky County was abolished on June 30, 1780, when it was divided into Fayette, Jefferson, and...

. The initial fort, at the northern tip of today's 12th street, was called Fort-on-Shore

Fort-on-Shore

Fort-on-Shore, built in 1778 by William Linn, was the first on-shore fort on the Ohio River in the area of what is now downtown Louisville, Kentucky. George Rogers Clark had directed Linn to move the militia post to the mainland from its original off-shore location at Corn Island...

. In response to the threat of British attacks, particularly Bird's invasion of Kentucky

Bird's invasion of Kentucky

Bird's invasion of Kentucky during the American Revolutionary War was one phase of an extensive planned series of operations planned by the British in 1780, whereby the entire West, from Quebec to the Gulf of Mexico, was to be swept clear of both Spanish and colonial resistance.While Bird's...

, a larger fort called Fort Nelson

Fort Nelson (Kentucky)

Fort Nelson, built in 1781 by Richard Chenoweth, was the second on-shore fort on the Ohio River in the area of what is now downtown Louisville, Kentucky. Fort-on-Shore, the downriver and first on-shore fort, had proved to be insufficient barely three years after it was established...

was built north of today's Main Street between Seventh and Eighth streets, covering nearly an acre. The GB￡

Pound sterling

The pound sterling , commonly called the pound, is the official currency of the United Kingdom, its Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories of South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands, British Antarctic Territory and Tristan da Cunha. It is subdivided into 100 pence...

15,000 contract was given to Richard Chenoweth, with construction beginning in late 1780 and completed by March 1781. The fort, thought to be capable of resisting cannon fire, was considered the strongest in the west after Fort Pitt

Fort Pitt (Pennsylvania)

Fort Pitt was a fort built at the location of Pittsburgh, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania.-French and Indian War:The fort was built from 1759 to 1761 during the French and Indian War , next to the site of former Fort Duquesne, at the confluence the Allegheny River and the Monongahela River...

. Due to decreasing need for strong forts after the Revolutionary War, it was in decline by the end of the decade.

In 1780, the Virginia General Assembly

Virginia General Assembly

The Virginia General Assembly is the legislative body of the Commonwealth of Virginia, and the oldest legislative body in the Western Hemisphere, established on July 30, 1619. The General Assembly is a bicameral body consisting of a lower house, the Virginia House of Delegates, with 100 members,...

and then-Governor

Governor of Virginia

The governor of Virginia serves as the chief executive of the Commonwealth of Virginia for a four-year term. The position is currently held by Republican Bob McDonnell, who was inaugurated on January 16, 2010, as the 71st governor of Virginia....

Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson was the principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence and the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom , the third President of the United States and founder of the University of Virginia...

approved the town charter of Louisville on May 1. Clark recruited early Kentucky pioneer James John Floyd

James John Floyd

James John Floyd , better known as John Floyd, was a pioneer of the Midwestern United States around the Louisville, Kentucky area where he worked as a surveyor for land development and as a military figure. Floyd was an early settler of St. Matthews, Kentucky and helped lay out Louisville...

, who was placed on the town's board of trustees and given the authority to plan and lay out the town. Jefferson County, named after Thomas Jefferson, was formed at this time as one of three original Kentucky counties from the old Kentucky County, Virginia

Kentucky County, Virginia

. Louisville was the county seat

County seat

A county seat is an administrative center, or seat of government, for a county or civil parish. The term is primarily used in the United States....

Also during 1780, three hundred families immigrated to the area, Louisville's first fire department was established, and the first street plan of Louisville was laid out by Willian Pope. Daniel Brodhead

Daniel Brodhead IV

Daniel Brodhead IV was an American military and political leader during the American Revolutionary War and early days of the United States.-Early life:...

opened Louisville's first general store

General store

A general store, general merchandise store, or village shop is a rural or small town store that carries a general line of merchandise. It carries a broad selection of merchandise, sometimes in a small space, where people from the town and surrounding rural areas come to purchase all their general...

in 1783. He became the first to move out of Louisville's early forts. James John Floyd became the first Judge in 1783 but was killed later that year. The first courthouse was completed in 1784 as a 16 by 20 feet (6.1 m) log cabin

Log cabin

A log cabin is a house built from logs. It is a fairly simple type of log house. A distinction should be drawn between the traditional meanings of "log cabin" and "log house." Historically most "Log cabins" were a simple one- or 1½-story structures, somewhat impermanent, and less finished or less...

. By this time, Louisville contained 63 clapboard finished houses, 37 partly finished, 22 uncovered houses, and over 100 log cabins. Shippingport

Shippingport, Kentucky

Shippingport, Kentucky is an industrial site and former settlement near Louisville, Kentucky on a peninsula near the Falls of the Ohio. It was incorporated without a name on October 10, 1785, then became Campbell Town after Revolutionary War soldier John Campbell, who had been granted the land for...

, incorporated in 1785, was a vital part of early Louisville, allowing goods to be transported through the Falls of the Ohio. The first church was built in 1790, the first hotel in 1793, and the first post office in 1795. During the 1780s and early 1790s, the town was not growing as fast as Lexington in central Kentucky. Factors were the threat of Indian attacks (ended in 1794 by the Battle of Fallen Timbers

Battle of Fallen Timbers

The Battle of Fallen Timbers was the final battle of the Northwest Indian War, a struggle between American Indian tribes affiliated with the Western Confederacy and the United States for control of the Northwest Territory...

), a complicated dispute over land ownership between John Campbell and the town's trustees (resolved in 1785), and Spanish policies restricting trade down the Mississippi

Mississippi

Mississippi is a U.S. state located in the Southern United States. Jackson is the state capital and largest city. The name of the state derives from the Mississippi River, which flows along its western boundary, whose name comes from the Ojibwe word misi-ziibi...

to New Orleans. By 1800, the population of Louisville was 359 compared to Lexington's 1,759.

From 1784 through 1792, a series of conventions were held to discuss the separation of Kentucky from Virginia. On June 1, 1792, Kentucky became the fifteenth state in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

and Isaac Shelby

Isaac Shelby

Isaac Shelby was the first and fifth Governor of the U.S. state of Kentucky and served in the state legislatures of Virginia and North Carolina. He was also a soldier in Lord Dunmore's War, the Revolutionary War, and the War of 1812...

was named the first Governor.

In 1803, Meriwether Lewis

Meriwether Lewis

Meriwether Lewis was an American explorer, soldier, and public administrator, best known for his role as the leader of the Lewis and Clark Expedition also known as the Corps of Discovery, with William Clark...

and William Clark organized their expedition across North America at the Falls of the Ohio and Louisville. The Lewis and Clark Expedition

Lewis and Clark Expedition

The Lewis and Clark Expedition, or ″Corps of Discovery Expedition" was the first transcontinental expedition to the Pacific Coast by the United States. Commissioned by President Thomas Jefferson and led by two Virginia-born veterans of Indian wars in the Ohio Valley, Meriwether Lewis and William...

would take the explorers across the western U.S., surveying the Louisiana Purchase

Louisiana Purchase

The Louisiana Purchase was the acquisition by the United States of America of of France's claim to the territory of Louisiana in 1803. The U.S...

, and eventually to the Pacific Ocean

Pacific Ocean

The Pacific Ocean is the largest of the Earth's oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic in the north to the Southern Ocean in the south, bounded by Asia and Australia in the west, and the Americas in the east.At 165.2 million square kilometres in area, this largest division of the World...

Antebellum

Since settlement, all people and cargo had arrived by flatboat

Flatboat

Fil1800flatboat.jpgA flatboat is a rectangular flat-bottomed boat with Fil1800flatboat.jpgA flatboat is a rectangular flat-bottomed boat with Fil1800flatboat.jpgA flatboat is a rectangular flat-bottomed boat with (mostlyNOTE: "(parenthesized)" wordings in the quote below are notes added to...

s and later keelboat

Keelboat

Keelboat has two distinct meanings related to two different types of boats: one a riverine cargo-capable working boat, and the other a classification for small- to mid-sized recreational sailing yachts.-Historical keel-boats:...

s, both of which were non-motorized vessels, meaning that it was prohibitively costly to send goods upstream (towards Pittsburgh and other developed areas). This technical limitation, combined with the Spanish decision in 1784 to close the Mississippi River

Mississippi River

below Vicksburg, Mississippi

Vicksburg, Mississippi

Vicksburg is a city in Warren County, Mississippi, United States. It is the only city in Warren County. It is located northwest of New Orleans on the Mississippi and Yazoo rivers, and due west of Jackson, the state capital. In 1900, 14,834 people lived in Vicksburg; in 1910, 20,814; in 1920,...

to American ships, meant there was very little outside market for goods produced early on in Louisville. This improved somewhat with Pinckney's Treaty

Pinckney's Treaty

Pinckney's Treaty, also known as the Treaty of San Lorenzo or the Treaty of Madrid, was signed in San Lorenzo de El Escorial on October 27, 1795 and established intentions of friendship between the United States and Spain. It also defined the boundaries of the United States with the Spanish...

, which opened the river and made New Orleans a Free trade

Free trade

Under a free trade policy, prices emerge from supply and demand, and are the sole determinant of resource allocation. 'Free' trade differs from other forms of trade policy where the allocation of goods and services among trading countries are determined by price strategies that may differ from...

zone by 1798.

However, most cargo was still being sent downstream in the early 19th century, averaging 60,000 tons downstream to 6,500 tons upstream. Boats passing through still had to unload all of their cargo before navigating the falls, a boon to local businesses. The frontier days quickly fading, log houses and forts began to disappear, and Louisville saw its first newspaper, the Louisville Gazette in 1807 and its first theatre in 1808, and the first dedicated church building in 1809. All of this reflected the 400% growth in population reported by the 1810 Census.

The economics of shipping were about to change, however, with the arrival of steamboat

Steamboat

A steamboat or steamship, sometimes called a steamer, is a ship in which the primary method of propulsion is steam power, typically driving propellers or paddlewheels...

s. The first, the New Orleans
New Orleans (steamboat)
The New Orleans was the first steamboat on the western waters of the United States. Its 1811-1812 voyage from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to New Orleans, Louisiana on the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers ushered in the era of commercial steamboat navigation on the western rivers.-Background:The New...

arrived in 1811, traveling downstream from Pittsburgh. Although it made the trip in record time

World record

A world record is usually the best global performance ever recorded and verified in a specific skill or sport. The book Guinness World Records collates and publishes notable records of all types, from first and best to worst human achievements, to extremes in the natural world and beyond...

, most believed its use was limited, as they did not believe a steamboat could make it back upriver against the current. However, in 1815, the Enterprise

Enterprise (1814)

The Enterprise, or Enterprize, demonstrated for the first time by her epic 2,200-mile voyage from New Orleans to Pittsburgh that steamboat commerce was practical on America's western rivers.-Early days:...

, captained by Henry Miller Shreve

Henry Miller Shreve

Henry Miller Shreve was the American inventor and steamboat captain who opened the Mississippi, Ohio and Red rivers to steamboat navigation. Shreveport, Louisiana, is named in his honor....

, became the first steamboat to travel from New Orleans to Louisville, showing the commercial potential of the steamboat in making upriver travel and shipping practical.

Industry and manufacturing reached Louisville and surrounding areas, especially Shippingport

Shippingport, Kentucky

, at this time. Some steamboats were built in Louisville and many early mills and factories opened. Other towns were developing at the falls: New Albany, Indiana

New Albany, Indiana

New Albany is a city in Floyd County, Indiana, United States, situated along the Ohio River opposite Louisville, Kentucky. In 1900, 20,628 people lived in New Albany; in 1910, 20,629; in 1920, 22,992; and in 1940, 25,414. The population was 36,372 at the 2010 census. The city is the county seat of...

in 1813 and Portland

Portland, Louisville

Portland is a neighborhood and former independent town two miles northwest of downtown Louisville, Kentucky. In its early days it was the largest of the six major settlements at the Falls of the Ohio River, the others being Shippingport and Louisville in Kentucky and New Albany, Clarksville, and...

in 1814, each competing with Louisville to become the dominant settlement in the area. Still, Louisville's population grew rapidly, tripling from 1810 to 1820. By 1830, it would surpass Lexington to become the state's largest city, and would eventually annex Portland and Shippingport.

In 1816 the Louisville Library Company, the city's first library, opened its doors with a subscription-based service. Also, in a series of events ranging from 1798 to 1846, the University of Louisville

University of Louisville

The University of Louisville is a public university in Louisville, Kentucky. When founded in 1798, it was the first city-owned public university in the United States and one of the first universities chartered west of the Allegheny Mountains. The university is mandated by the Kentucky General...

was founded from the Jefferson Seminary

Jefferson Seminary

The Jefferson Seminary was one of Kentucky's first schools and is considered to be the direct ancestor of the University of Louisville.The school was chartered by the Kentucky General Assembly in 1798, with the sale of 6,000 acres of land in rural southern Kentucky used to pay for initial...

, Louisville Medical Institute

Louisville Medical Institute

The Louisville Medical Institute was a medical school founded in 1837 in Louisville, Kentucky. It would be merged with two other colleges into the University of Louisville in 1846 and is considered the ancestor of the university's present day medical school....

and Louisville Collegiate Institute.

In response to great demand, the Louisville and Portland Canal

Louisville and Portland Canal

The Louisville and Portland Canal was a canal bypassing the Falls of the Ohio in the Ohio River near Louisville, Kentucky. It opened in 1830, and was operated by the Louisville and Portland Canal Company until 1874, and became the McAlpine Locks and Dam in 1962 after heavy modernization.Although...

was completed in 1830. This allowed boats to circumvent the Falls of the Ohio and travel through from Pittsburgh to New Orleans. In response to several epidemics and the increasing need to treat ill or injured river workers, Louisville Marine Hospital was completed in 1825 on Chestnut Street, an area that is today home to Louisville's Medical Center.

In 1828, the population surpassed 7,000 and Louisville became Kentucky's first city. John Bucklin

John Bucklin

John Carpenter Bucklin was the first mayor of the city of Louisville. His father, a merchant and sailor, was a captain in the Navy during the Revolutionary War. John Bucklin served in the Rhode Island militia, owned several ships, and married Sarah Smith in 1803...

was elected the first Mayor. The nearby towns of Shippingport and Portland remained independent of Louisville for the time being. City status gave Louisville some judicial authority and the ability to collect more taxes, which allowed for the establishment of the state's first public school in 1829.

In 1831, Catherine Spalding

Catherine Spalding

Catherine Spalding , in 1813, aged nineteen, when no education for girls, no private health care, and no organized social services existed on the Kentucky frontier, was elected leader of six women forming a new religious community, the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth...

moved from Bardstown

Bardstown, Kentucky

As of the census of 2010, there were 11,700 people, 4,712 households, and 2,949 families residing in the city. The population density was . There were 5,113 housing units at an average density of...

to Louisville and established Presentation Academy

Presentation Academy

Presentation Academy, a college-preparatory high school for young women, is located just south of Downtown Louisville, Kentucky in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Louisville...

, a Catholic

Catholic

The word catholic comes from the Greek phrase , meaning "on the whole," "according to the whole" or "in general", and is a combination of the Greek words meaning "about" and meaning "whole"...

school for girls. She also established the St. Vincent Orphanage, which was later renamed as St. Joseph Orphanage.

Louisville's famous Galt House

Galt House

The Galt House is a 25-story, 1300-room hotel in Louisville, Kentucky. The original hotel was erected in 1837. The current Galt House is presently the city's only hotel on the Ohio River. Many noted people have stayed at the Galt House, including Jefferson Davis, Charles Dickens, Abraham Lincoln...

hotel—the first of three downtown buildings to have that moniker—was erected in 1834. In 1839, a precursor to the modern Kentucky Derby

Kentucky Derby

The Kentucky Derby is a Grade I stakes race for three-year-old Thoroughbred horses, held annually in Louisville, Kentucky, United States on the first Saturday in May, capping the two-week-long Kentucky Derby Festival. The race is one and a quarter mile at Churchill Downs. Colts and geldings carry...

was held at Old Louisville's Oakland Race Course

Race track

A race track is a purpose-built facility for racing of animals , automobiles, motorcycles or athletes. A race track may also feature grandstands or concourses. Some motorsport tracks are called speedways.A racetrack is a permanent facility or building...

. Over 10,000 spectators attended the two-horse race, in which Grey Eagle lost to Wagner. This race occurred 36 years before the first Kentucky Derby. It was a popular competition to test the quality of horses. Louisville became a center for sales of horses and other livestock from the Bluegrass Region

Bluegrass region

The Bluegrass Region is a geographic region in the state of Kentucky, United States. It occupies the northern part of the state and since European settlement has contained a majority of the state's population and its largest cities....

of central Kentucky, where horse breeding became a major part of the economy and traditions.

The Kentucky School for the Blind

Kentucky School for the Blind

The Kentucky School for the Blind is an educational facility for blind and visually impaired students from Kentucky up to age 21.Bryce McLellan Patten founded the Kentucky Institution for the Education of the Blind in 1839 in Louisville, Kentucky...

was founded in 1839, the third-oldest school for the blind in the country.

In 1848, Zachary Taylor

Zachary Taylor

Zachary Taylor was the 12th President of the United States and an American military leader. Initially uninterested in politics, Taylor nonetheless ran as a Whig in the 1848 presidential election, defeating Lewis Cass...

, resident of Jefferson County from childhood through early adulthood and a hero of the Mexican–American War

Mexican–American War

The Mexican–American War, also known as the First American Intervention, the Mexican War, or the U.S.–Mexican War, was an armed conflict between the United States and Mexico from 1846 to 1848 in the wake of the 1845 U.S...

, was elected as the 12th President of the United States

President of the United States

The President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....

. He served only sixteen months in office before dying in 1850 from acute gastroenteritis

Gastroenteritis

Gastroenteritis is marked by severe inflammation of the gastrointestinal tract involving both the stomach and small intestine resulting in acute diarrhea and vomiting. It can be transferred by contact with contaminated food and water...

. He was buried in the east end of Louisville at Zachary Taylor National Cemetery

Zachary Taylor National Cemetery

Zachary Taylor National Cemetery, located at 4701 Brownsboro Road , in northeast Louisville, Kentucky is a national cemetery where former President of the United States Zachary Taylor and his first lady Margaret Taylor are buried. Zachary Taylor National Cemetery was listed in the National...

.

Following the 1850 Census

United States Census

The United States Census is a decennial census mandated by the United States Constitution. The population is enumerated every 10 years and the results are used to allocate Congressional seats , electoral votes, and government program funding. The United States Census Bureau The United States Census...

, Louisville was reported as the nation's tenth largest city, while Kentucky

Kentucky

The Commonwealth of Kentucky is a state located in the East Central United States of America. As classified by the United States Census Bureau, Kentucky is a Southern state, more specifically in the East South Central region. Kentucky is one of four U.S. states constituted as a commonwealth...

was reported as the eighth most populous state.

The Louisville and Nashville Railroad

Louisville and Nashville Railroad

The Louisville and Nashville Railroad was a Class I railroad that operated freight and passenger services in the southeast United States.Chartered by the state of Kentucky in 1850, the L&N, as it was generally known, grew into one of the great success stories of American business...

(L&N) Company was founded in 1850 by James Guthrie, who also was involved in the founding of the University of Louisville. When the railroad was completed in 1859, Louisville's strategic location at the Falls of the Ohio became central to the city's development and importance in the rail and water freight transportation business.

On August 6, 1855, a day dubbed Bloody Monday

Bloody Monday

Bloody Monday was the name given the election riots of August 6, 1855, in Louisville, Kentucky. These riots grew out of the bitter rivalry between the Democrats and supporters of the Know-Nothing Party. Rumors were started that foreigners and Catholics had interfered with the process of voting...

, election

Election

An election is a formal decision-making process by which a population chooses an individual to hold public office. Elections have been the usual mechanism by which modern representative democracy operates since the 17th century. Elections may fill offices in the legislature, sometimes in the...

riots stemming from the bitter rivalry between the Democrats

Democratic Party (United States)

The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...

and supporters of the Know-Nothing Party

Know Nothing

The Know Nothing was a movement by the nativist American political faction of the 1840s and 1850s. It was empowered by popular fears that the country was being overwhelmed by German and Irish Catholic immigrants, who were often regarded as hostile to Anglo-Saxon Protestant values and controlled by...

broke out. Know-Nothing mobs rioted in Irish

History of the Irish in Louisville

The history of the Irish in Louisville is a long one as involvement of Irish in Louisville, Kentucky dates to the founding of the city. The two major waves of Irish influence on Louisville were first the Scots-Irish in the late 18th century, and those who escaped from the Irish Potato Famine of...

and German

History of the Germans in Louisville

The history of the Germans in Louisville began in 1787. In that year, a man named Kaye built the first brick house in Louisville, Kentucky. The Blankenbaker, Bruner, and Funk families came to the Louisville region following the American Revolutionary War, and in 1797 they founded the town...

parts of the city, destroying property by fires and killing numerous people.

Founded in 1858, the American Printing House for the Blind is the oldest organization of its kind in the United States. Since 1879 it has been the official supplier of educational materials for blind students in the U.S. It is located on Frankfort Avenue in the Clifton neighborhood

Clifton, Louisville

Clifton, a neighborhood east of downtown Louisville, Kentucky USA. Clifton was named because of its hilly location on the Ohio River valley escarpment....

, adjacent to the campus where the Kentucky School for the Blind moved in 1855.

"Sold down the river"

Louisville had one of the largest slave trades in the United States before the Civil War

American Civil War

The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...

, and much of the city's initial growth is attributed to that trade. Shifting agricultural needs produced an excess of slaves in Kentucky, and many were sold from here and other parts of the Upper South to the Deep South

Deep South

The Deep South is a descriptive category of the cultural and geographic subregions in the American South. Historically, it is differentiated from the "Upper South" as being the states which were most dependent on plantation type agriculture during the pre-Civil War period...

. In 1820, the slave population was at its height at nearly 26% of the Kentucky population, but by 1860, that proportion had dropped to 7.8%, even though this percentage still represented over 10,000 people. Through the 1850s, slave traders sold 2500-4000 slaves annually from Kentucky down river.

The expression "sold down the river" originated as a lament of eastern slaves being split apart from their families in sales to Louisville. Slave traders collected slaves there until they had enough to ship in a group via the Ohio and Mississippi rivers down to the slave market in New Orleans. There slaves were sold again to owners of cotton and sugar cane plantations.

Louisville was the turning point for many enslaved black

African American

s. If they could get from there across the Ohio River, called the "River Jordan" by escaping slaves, they had a chance for freedom in Ohio and other northern states. They had to evade capture by bounty-seeking slave catchers, but many were aided by the Underground Railroad

Underground Railroad

The Underground Railroad was an informal network of secret routes and safe houses used by 19th-century black slaves in the United States to escape to free states and Canada with the aid of abolitionists and allies who were sympathetic to their cause. The term is also applied to the abolitionists,...

to get further north for freedom.

Civil War

During the Civil War

American Civil War

, Louisville was a major stronghold of Union forces

Union Army

The Union Army was the land force that fought for the Union during the American Civil War. It was also known as the Federal Army, the U.S. Army, the Northern Army and the National Army...

, which kept Kentucky

Kentucky

firmly in the Union. It was the center of planning, supplies, recruiting and transportation for numerous campaigns, especially in the Western Theater

Western Theater of the American Civil War

This article presents an overview of major military and naval operations in the Western Theater of the American Civil War.-Theater of operations:...

. While the state of Kentucky officially declared its neutrality

Neutral country

A neutral power in a particular war is a sovereign state which declares itself to be neutral towards the belligerents. A non-belligerent state does not need to be neutral. The rights and duties of a neutral power are defined in Sections 5 and 13 of the Hague Convention of 1907...

early in the war, prominent Louisville attorney James Speed

James Speed

, brother of President

President of the United States

Abraham Lincoln

's close friend Joshua Fry Speed

Joshua Fry Speed

Joshua Fry Speed was a close friend of Abraham Lincoln from his days in Springfield, Illinois, where Speed was a partner in a general store...

, strongly advocated keeping the state in the Union. Seeing Louisville's strategic importance in the freight industry, General William Tecumseh Sherman

William Tecumseh Sherman

William Tecumseh Sherman was an American soldier, businessman, educator and author. He served as a General in the Union Army during the American Civil War , for which he received recognition for his outstanding command of military strategy as well as criticism for the harshness of the "scorched...

formed an army base

Military base

A military base is a facility directly owned and operated by or for the military or one of its branches that shelters military equipment and personnel, and facilitates training and operations. In general, a military base provides accommodations for one or more units, but it may also be used as a...

in the city in the event that the Confederacy

Confederate States of America

The Confederate States of America was a government set up from 1861 to 1865 by 11 Southern slave states of the United States of America that had declared their secession from the U.S...

advanced.

In September 1862, Confederate

Confederate States Army

The Confederate States Army was the army of the Confederate States of America while the Confederacy existed during the American Civil War. On February 8, 1861, delegates from the seven Deep South states which had already declared their secession from the United States of America adopted the...

General Braxton Bragg

Braxton Bragg

Braxton Bragg was a career United States Army officer, and then a general in the Confederate States Army—a principal commander in the Western Theater of the American Civil War and later the military adviser to Confederate President Jefferson Davis.Bragg, a native of North Carolina, was...

decided to take Louisville, but changed his mind. There was lack of backup from General Edmund Kirby Smith

Edmund Kirby Smith

Edmund Kirby Smith was a career United States Army officer and educator. He served as a general in the Confederate States Army during the American Civil War, notable for his command of the Trans-Mississippi Department of the Confederacy after the fall of Vicksburg.After the conflict ended Smith...

's forces. In addition, the decision to install Confederate Governor Richard Hawes

Richard Hawes

Richard Hawes was a United States Representative from Kentucky and the second Confederate Governor of Kentucky. He was part of an influential political family, with a brother, uncle, and cousin who also served as U.S. Representatives. He began his political career as an ardent Whig and was a close...

in the alternative government in Frankfort

Frankfort, Kentucky

Frankfort is a city in Kentucky that serves as the state capital and the county seat of Franklin County. The population was 27,741 at the 2000 census; by population it is the 5th smallest state capital in the United States...

made people think the state might change. In the summer of 1863, Confederate cavalry under John Hunt Morgan

John Hunt Morgan

John Hunt Morgan was a Confederate general and cavalry officer in the American Civil War.Morgan is best known for Morgan's Raid when, in 1863, he and his men rode over 1,000 miles covering a region from Tennessee, up through Kentucky, into Indiana and on to southern Ohio...

invaded Kentucky from Tennessee

Tennessee

and briefly threatened Louisville, before swinging around the city into Indiana

Indiana

Indiana is a US state, admitted to the United States as the 19th on December 11, 1816. It is located in the Midwestern United States and Great Lakes Region. With 6,483,802 residents, the state is ranked 15th in population and 16th in population density. Indiana is ranked 38th in land area and is...

during Morgan's Raid

Morgan's Raid

Morgan's Raid was a highly publicized incursion by Confederate cavalry into the Northern states of Indiana and Ohio during the American Civil War. The raid took place from June 11–July 26, 1863, and is named for the commander of the Confederates, Brig. Gen...

. In March 1864, Generals Sherman and Ulysses S. Grant

Ulysses S. Grant

Ulysses S. Grant was the 18th President of the United States as well as military commander during the Civil War and post-war Reconstruction periods. Under Grant's command, the Union Army defeated the Confederate military and ended the Confederate States of America...

met at the Galt House

Galt House

to plan the spring campaign, which included the capture of Atlanta, Georgia

Atlanta Campaign

The Atlanta Campaign was a series of battles fought in the Western Theater of the American Civil War throughout northwest Georgia and the area around Atlanta during the summer of 1864. Union Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman invaded Georgia from the vicinity of Chattanooga, Tennessee, beginning in May...

.

By the end of the war, Louisville itself had not been attacked once, although it was surrounded by skirmishes and battles, including the Battle of Perryville

Battle of Perryville

The Battle of Perryville, also known as the Battle of Chaplin Hills, was fought on October 8, 1862, in the Chaplin Hills west of Perryville, Kentucky, as the culmination of the Confederate Heartland Offensive during the American Civil War. Confederate Gen. Braxton Bragg's Army of Mississippi won a...

and the Battle of Corydon

Battle of Corydon

The Battle of Corydon was a minor engagement that took place July 9, 1863, just south of Corydon, which had been the original capital of Indiana until 1825, and was the county seat of Harrison County. The attack occurred during Morgan's Raid in the American Civil War as a force of 2,500 cavalry...

. The Unionists—most whose leaders owned slaves—felt betrayed by the abolitionist

Abolitionism

Abolitionism is a movement to end slavery.In western Europe and the Americas abolitionism was a movement to end the slave trade and set slaves free. At the behest of Dominican priest Bartolomé de las Casas who was shocked at the treatment of natives in the New World, Spain enacted the first...

position of the Republican Party

Republican Party (United States)

The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...

. After 1865 returning Confederate

Confederate States Army

veterans largely took political control of the city, leading to the jibe that it joined the Confederacy after the war was over.

During the postwar years, Confederate women organized in associations to ensure the dead were buried in cemeteries, to identify missing men, and to build memorials to the war and their losses. By the 1890s, the memorial movement came under the control of the United Daughters of the Confederacy

United Daughters of the Confederacy

The United Daughters of the Confederacy is a women's heritage association dedicated to honoring the memory of those who served in the military and died in service to the Confederate States of America . UDC began as the National Association of the Daughters of the Confederacy, organized in 1894 by...

(UDC) and United Confederate Veterans

United Confederate Veterans

The United Confederate Veterans, also known as the UCV, was a veteran's organization for former Confederate soldiers of the American Civil War, and was equivalent to the Grand Army of the Republic which was the organization for Union veterans....

(UCV), who promoted the "Lost Cause". Making meaning after the war was another way of writing its history. In 1895, in one of their successes, a Confederate monument was erected near the University of Louisville

University of Louisville

campus.

Post-Reconstruction

The first Kentucky Derby

Kentucky Derby

was held on May 17, 1875, at the Louisville Jockey Club track (later renamed to Churchill Downs

Churchill Downs

Churchill Downs, located in Central Avenue in south Louisville, Kentucky, United States, is a Thoroughbred racetrack most famous for hosting the Kentucky Derby annually. It officially opened in 1875, and held the first Kentucky Derby and the first Kentucky Oaks in the same year. Churchill Downs...

). The Derby was originally shepherded by Meriwether Lewis Clark, Jr., the grandson of William Clark of the Lewis and Clark Expedition

Lewis and Clark Expedition

. Ten thousand spectators were present at the first Derby to watch Aristides win the race.

On February 2, 1876, professional baseball

Professional baseball

Baseball is a team sport which is played by several professional leagues throughout the world. In these leagues, and associated farm teams, players are selected for their talents and are paid to play for a specific team or club system....

launched the National League

National League

The National League of Professional Baseball Clubs, known simply as the National League , is the older of two leagues constituting Major League Baseball, and the world's oldest extant professional team sports league. Founded on February 2, 1876, to replace the National Association of Professional...

, and the Louisville Grays

Louisville Grays

The Louisville Grays were a 19th century U.S. baseball team and charter member of the National League, based in Louisville, Kentucky. They played two seasons, 1876 and 1877, and compiled a record of 65–61. Their home games were at the Louisville Baseball Park. The Grays were owned by...

were a charter member. While the Grays were a relatively short-lived team, playing for only two years, they began a much longer lasting relationship between the city and baseball. In 1883, John "Bud" Hillerich made his first baseball bat

Baseball bat

A baseball bat is a smooth wooden or metal club used in the game of baseball to hit the ball after the ball is thrown by the pitcher. It is no more than 2.75 inches in diameter at the thickest part and no more than 42 inches in length. It typically weighs no more than 33 ounces , but it...

from white ash

White Ash

For another species referred to as white ash, see Eucalyptus fraxinoides.Fraxinus americana is a species of Fraxinus native to eastern North America found in mesophytic hardwood forests from Nova Scotia west to Minnesota, south to northern Florida, and southwest to eastern...

in his father's wood shop. The first bat was produced for Pete "The Gladiator" Browning

Pete Browning

Louis Rogers "Pete" Browning was an American center and left fielder in Major League Baseball from 1882 to 1894 who played primarily for the Louisville Eclipse/Colonels, becoming one of the sport's most accomplished batters of the 1880s...

of the Louisville Eclipse (minor league team). The bats eventually become known by the popular name, Louisville Slugger, and the local company Hillerich & Bradsby

Hillerich & Bradsby

Hillerich & Bradsby Company is a company located in Louisville, Kentucky that produces the famous Louisville Slugger baseball bat. The Louisville Slugger Museum & Factory in downtown Louisville features a retrospective of the product and its use throughout baseball history...

rapidly became one of the largest manufacturers of baseball bats and other sporting equipment in the world. Today, Hillerich & Bradsby manufactures over one million wooden bats per year, accounting for about two of three wooden bats sold worldwide.

In 1877 the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary

Southern Baptist Theological Seminary

The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary , located in Louisville, Kentucky, is the oldest of the six seminaries affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention . The seminary was founded in 1859, at Greenville, South Carolina. After being closed during the Civil War, it moved in 1877 to Louisville...

relocated to Louisville from Greenville, South Carolina

Greenville, South Carolina

-Law and government:The city of Greenville adopted the Council-Manager form of municipal government in 1976.-History:The area was part of the Cherokee Nation's protected grounds after the Treaty of 1763, which ended the French and Indian War. No White man was allowed to enter, though some families...

, where it had been founded in 1859. Its new campus, at Fourth and Broadway downtown, was underwritten by a group of Louisville business leaders, including the Norton family, eager to add the promising graduate-professional school to the city's resources. It grew quickly, attracting students from all parts of the nation, and by the early 20th century it was the second largest accredited seminary in the United States. It relocated to its present 100 acre (0.404686 km²) campus on Lexington Road in 1926.

On August 1, 1883, U.S. President

President of the United States

Chester A. Arthur

Chester Alan Arthur was the 21st President of the United States . Becoming President after the assassination of President James A. Garfield, Arthur struggled to overcome suspicions of his beginnings as a politician from the New York City Republican machine, succeeding at that task by embracing...

opened the first annual Southern Exposition

Southern Exposition

, a series of World's Fair

World's Fair

World's fair, World fair, Universal Exposition, and World Expo are various large public exhibitions held in different parts of the world. The first Expo was held in The Crystal Palace in Hyde Park, London, United Kingdom, in 1851, under the title "Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All...

s that would run for five consecutive years adjacent to Central Park

Central Park, Louisville

Central Park is a municipal park maintained by the city of Louisville, Kentucky. Located in the Old Louisville neighborhood, it was first developed for public use in the 1870s and referred to as "DuPont Square" since it was at that time part of the Du Pont family estate.During the Southern...

in what is now Old Louisville

Old Louisville

Old Louisville is a historic district and neighborhood in central Louisville, Kentucky, USA. It is the third largest such district in the United States, and the largest preservation district featuring almost entirely Victorian architecture...

. Highlighted at the show was the largest to-date installation of incandescent light bulb

Incandescent light bulb

s, having been recently invented by Thomas Edison

Thomas Edison

, a former resident.

Downtown Louisville began a modernization period in the 1890s, with Louisville's second skyscraper, the Columbia Building, opening on January 1, 1890. The following year, famous landscape architect

Landscape architect

A landscape architect is a person involved in the planning, design and sometimes direction of a landscape, garden, or distinct space. The professional practice is known as landscape architecture....

Frederick Law Olmsted

Frederick Law Olmsted was an American journalist, social critic, public administrator, and landscape designer. He is popularly considered to be the father of American landscape architecture, although many scholars have bestowed that title upon Andrew Jackson Downing...

was commissioned to design Louisville's system of parks (most notably, Cherokee

Cherokee Park

Cherokee Park is a municipal park located in Louisville, Kentucky, United States. It was designed, like 18 of Louisville's 123 public parks, by Frederick Law Olmsted, the father of landscape architecture...

, Iroquois

Iroquois Park

Iroquois Park is a 739 acre municipal park in Louisville, Kentucky, United States. It was designed by Frederick Law Olmsted, who also designed Louisville's Cherokee Park and Shawnee Park, at what were then the edges of the city. Located south of downtown, Iroquois Park was promoted as...

and Shawnee

Shawnee Park

Shawnee Park is a municipal park in Louisville, Kentucky. It was designed by Frederick Law Olmsted, who designed 18 of the city's 123 public parks...

Parks) connected by tree-lined parkways. Passenger train service arrived in the city on September 7, 1891 with the completion of the Union Station

Union Station (Louisville)

The Union Station of Louisville, Kentucky is a historic railroad station that serves as offices for the Transit Authority of River City, as it has since mid-April 1980 after receiving a year-long restoration costing approximately $2 million. It was one of three union stations in Kentucky, the other...

train hub. The first train arrived at 7:30 am. Louisville's Union Station was then recognized as the largest train station

Train station

A train station, also called a railroad station or railway station and often shortened to just station,"Station" is commonly understood to mean "train station" unless otherwise qualified. This is evident from dictionary entries e.g...

in the South.

Interrupting these developments, on March 27, 1890, a major tornado measuring F4

Fujita scale

The Fujita scale , or Fujita-Pearson scale, is a scale for rating tornado intensity, based primarily on the damage tornadoes inflict on human-built structures and vegetation...

on the Fujita scale

Fujita scale

The Fujita scale , or Fujita-Pearson scale, is a scale for rating tornado intensity, based primarily on the damage tornadoes inflict on human-built structures and vegetation...

visited Louisville. The "whirling tiger of the air" carved a path from the Parkland

Parkland, Louisville

Parkland is a neighborhood in Louisville, Kentucky, USA. Its boundaries are 34th Street on the west, West Broadway on the north, Woodland Avenue on the south and 26th Street on the east....

neighborhood all the way to Crescent Hill

Crescent Hill, Louisville

Crescent Hill is a neighborhood four miles east of downtown Louisville, Kentucky USA. Area was originally called "Beargrass" because it sits on a ridge between two forks of Beargrass Creek....

, destroying 766 buildings ($

United States dollar

The United States dollar , also referred to as the American dollar, is the official currency of the United States of America. It is divided into 100 smaller units called cents or pennies....

2½ million worth of property) and killing an estimated 74 to 120 people. At least 55 of those deaths occurred when the Falls City Hall collapsed. This is one of the highest death tolls due to a single building collapse from a tornado in U.S. history

History of the United States

The history of the United States traditionally starts with the Declaration of Independence in the year 1776, although its territory was inhabited by Native Americans since prehistoric times and then by European colonists who followed the voyages of Christopher Columbus starting in 1492. The...

.

In 1893, two Louisville sisters, Patty

Patty Hill

Patty Smith Hill is perhaps best known for co-writing the tune which became popular as Happy Birthday to You. She was an American nursery school, kindergarten teacher, and key founder of the National Association Nursery Education which now exists as the National Association For the Education of...

and Mildred J. Hill

Mildred J. Hill

Mildred J. Hill was an American songwriter and musicologist, who composed the melody for "Good Morning to All", later used as the melody for "Happy Birthday to You".-Biography:...

, both schoolteachers, wrote the song "Good Morning to All" for their kindergarten class. The song did not become popular, and the lyrics were later changed to the more recognizable, "Happy Birthday to You

Happy Birthday to You

"Happy Birthday to You", also known more simply as "Happy Birthday", is a song that is traditionally sung to celebrate the anniversary of a person's birth...

". This is now the most performed song in the English language

English language

English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...

.

Also in 1893, the Louisville Presbyterian Seminary was founded, building a handsome campus at First and Broadway downtown (now occupied by Jefferson Community College). Eight years later, it absorbed an older Presbyterian seminary in Danville, Kentucky

Danville, Kentucky

Danville is a city in and the county seat of Boyle County, Kentucky, United States. The population was 16,218 at the 2010 census.Danville is the principal city of the Danville Micropolitan Statistical Area, which includes all of Boyle and Lincoln counties....

. In 1963 Louisville Seminary relocated to a modern campus on Alta Vista Road near Cherokee Park.

Early 20th century

In the early 20th century, controversy over political corruption

Political corruption

Political corruption is the use of legislated powers by government officials for illegitimate private gain. Misuse of government power for other purposes, such as repression of political opponents and general police brutality, is not considered political corruption. Neither are illegal acts by...

came to a head in the 1905 Mayor election, called the most corrupt in city history. An anti-corruption party unique to Louisville, called themselves the Fusionists, briefly emerged at this time. Democratic boss John Whallen succeeded in getting his candidate, Paul C. Barth

Paul C. Barth

Paul C. Barth was Mayor of Louisville, Kentucky from 1905 to 1907. The son of a cabinetmaker who died when Barth was 11, he took financial responsibility for the family at an early age...

, elected, but the results were overturned in 1907. Elections gradually became less corrupt, but political machines would still hold considerable power for decades.

The Waverly Hills Sanatorium

Waverly Hills Sanatorium

The Waverly Hills Sanatorium is a closed sanatorium located in southwestern Louisville/Jefferson County, Kentucky. It opened in 1910 as a two-story hospital to accommodate 40 to 50 tuberculosis patients. In the early 1900s, Jefferson County was ravaged by an outbreak of tuberculosis which prompted...

was opened in 1910 to house tuberculosis

Tuberculosis

Tuberculosis, MTB, or TB is a common, and in many cases lethal, infectious disease caused by various strains of mycobacteria, usually Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Tuberculosis usually attacks the lungs but can also affect other parts of the body...

patients. The hospital was closed in 1961. It was later used as a retirement home

Retirement home

A retirement home is a multi-residence housing facility intended for senior citizens. Typically each person or couple in the home has an apartment-style room or suite of rooms. Additional facilities are provided within the building, including facilities for meals, gathering, recreation, and some...

(1963–1981). It was unused for more than a decade until 1991, when it was reopened for tours.

During World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

, Louisville became home to Camp Taylor

Camp Taylor

Camp Taylor is a neighborhood and former military base six miles southeast of downtown Louisville, Kentucky, USA. First announced on June 11, 1917 it was originally a military camp named for former president Zachary Taylor...

. In 1917, the English-bred colt "Omar Khayyam" became the first foreign-bred horse to win the Kentucky Derby

Kentucky Derby

. Two years later, in 1919, Sir Barton

Sir Barton

Sir Barton, , was a chestnut thoroughbred colt who in 1919 became the first winner of the American Triple Crown.He was sired by leading stud Star Shoot out of the Hanover mare Lady Sterling. His grandsire was the 1893 English Triple Crown champion, Isinglass.Sir Barton was bred in Kentucky by...

became the first horse to win the Triple Crown

Triple Crown of Thoroughbred Racing

The Triple Crown of Thoroughbred Racing consists of three races for three-year-old Thoroughbred horses. Winning all three of these Thoroughbred horse races is considered the greatest accomplishment of a Thoroughbred racehorse...

, though the term for the three prime races did not come into use for another 11 years.

In 1920, Louisville's first zoo was founded at Senning's Park

Senning's Park

Senning's Park was a park located across New Cut Road from Iroquois Park in Louisville, Kentucky, on the site of present-day Colonial Gardens. It was the site of the first zoo in Louisville, Kentucky's largest city.-Zoo days:...

(present-day Colonial Gardens), next to Iroquois Park

Iroquois Park

. Barely surviving through the Great Depression

Great Depression

The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...

, it closed in 1939. Its successor, the current Louisville Zoo

Louisville Zoo

Founded in 1969, the Louisville Zoo, or the Louisville Zoological Garden, is a zoo in Louisville, Kentucky, situated in the city's Poplar Level neighborhood...

, did not open until 1969.

In 1923, the Brown Hotel's chef Fred K. Schmidt introduced the Hot Brown

Hot Brown

A Hot Brown Sandwich is a hot sandwich originally created at the Brown Hotel in Louisville, Kentucky, by Fred K. Schmidt in 1926. It is a variation of traditional Welsh rarebit and was one of two signature sandwiches created by chefs at the Brown Hotel shortly after its founding in 1923...

sandwich in the hotel restaurant, consisting of an open-faced "sandwich" of turkey and bacon smothered with cheese and tomato. The Hot Brown became rather popular among locals and visitors alike, and can be ordered by many local restaurants in the area today.

The Belle of Louisville

Belle of Louisville

The Belle of Louisville is a steamboat owned and operated by the city of Louisville, Kentucky and moored at its downtown wharf next to the Riverfront Plaza/Belvedere during its annual operational period...

, today recognized as the oldest river steamboat in operation, came to Louisville in 1931. That same year, the Louisville Municipal College for Negroes was established to allow black Louisvillians to attend classes. (The college was dissolved into the University of Louisville with the ending of segregation

Desegregation

Desegregation is the process of ending the separation of two groups usually referring to races. This is most commonly used in reference to the United States. Desegregation was long a focus of the American Civil Rights Movement, both before and after the United States Supreme Court's decision in...

in 1951.)

In late January and February 1937, a month of heavy rain throughout the Ohio River Valley prompted what became remembered as the "Great Flood of '37"

Ohio River flood of 1937

The Ohio River flood of 1937 took place in late January and February 1937. With damage stretching from Pittsburgh to Cairo, Illinois, one million persons were left homeless, with 385 dead and property losses reaching $500 million...

. The flood

Flood

A flood is an overflow of an expanse of water that submerges land. The EU Floods directive defines a flood as a temporary covering by water of land not normally covered by water...

submerged about 70 percent of the city and forced the evacuation of 175,000 residents. In Louisville, 90 people died. At the crest on January 27, 1937, the waters reached 30 feet (9.1 m) above flood level in Louisville. Photojournalist

Photojournalism

Photojournalism is a particular form of journalism that creates images in order to tell a news story. It is now usually understood to refer only to still images, but in some cases the term also refers to video used in broadcast journalism...

Margaret Bourke-White

Margaret Bourke-White was an American photographer and documentary photographer. She is best known as the first foreign photographer permitted to take pictures of Soviet Industry, the first female war correspondent and the first female photographer for Henry Luce's Life magazine, where her...

documented the flood and its aftermath in a series of famous photos. Later, flood wall

Flood wall

A flood wall is a primarily vertical artificial barrier designed to temporarily contain the waters of a river or other waterway which may rise to unusual levels during seasonal or extreme weather events...

s were installed to prevent another such disaster.

Standiford Field

Louisville International Airport

was built in Louisville by the Army Corps of Engineers in 1941. Bowman Field, a smaller airport, had been previously opened in 1919.

Louisville was a center for factory war production during World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

. In May 1942, the U.S. government assigned the Curtiss-Wright

Curtiss-Wright

The Curtiss-Wright Corporation was the largest aircraft manufacturer in the United States at the end of World War II, but has evolved to largely become a component manufacturer, specializing in actuators, aircraft controls, valves, and metalworking....

Aircraft Company a war plant located at Louisville's air field for wartime aircraft production. The factory produced the C-46 Commando

C-46 Commando

The Curtiss-Wright C-46 Commando was a transport aircraft originally derived from a commercial high-altitude airliner design. It was instead used as a military transport during World War II by the United States Army Air Forces as well as the U.S. Navy/Marine Corps under the designation R5C...

cargo plane, among other aircraft. In 1946 the factory was sold to International Harvester

International Harvester

International Harvester Company was a United States agricultural machinery, construction equipment, vehicle, commercial truck, and household and commercial products manufacturer. In 1902, J.P...

Corporation, which began large-scale production of tractors and agricultural equipment. Otter Creek Park

Otter Creek Park

Otter Creek Outdoor Recreation Area is a 2,600 acre riverfront park in Meade County, Kentucky. The park is located near Muldraugh and Fort Knox, along State Highway 1638, near U.S. 31W...

was given to Louisville by the U.S. Government in 1947, in recognition of the city's service during World War II.

Throughout the 20th century, the arts flourished in Louisville. The Speed Art Museum

Speed Art Museum

The Speed Art Museum, originally known as the J.B. Speed Memorial Museum, now colloquially referred to as the Speed by locals, is the oldest, largest, and foremost museum of art in Kentucky...

was opened in 1927 and is now the oldest and largest museum of art in Kentucky. The Louisville Orchestra

Louisville Orchestra

The Louisville Orchestra is the primary orchestra in Louisville, Kentucky and has been called the cornerstone of the Louisville arts scene. It was founded in 1937 by Robert Whitney and Charles Farnsley, Mayor of Louisville...

was founded in 1937. In 1949 the Kentucky Shakespeare Festival

Kentucky Shakespeare Festival

'Kentucky Shakespeare', commonly called Shakespeare in the Park, is a cultural event which features free Shakespeare performances every summer in Central Park in Old Louisville . Begun as the Carriage House Players in 1949, it is the oldest free professional and independently-operating Shakespeare...

was begun, and today it is the oldest free and independently-operating Shakespeare festival in the United States. The Kentucky Opera

Kentucky Opera

The Kentucky Opera is the state opera of Kentucky, located in Louisville. The operas are accompanied by the Louisville Orchestra. Founded in 1952 by Moritz von Bomhard, it is the twelfth oldest opera company in the United States and has a more than $2 million budget. The Kentucky Opera is an...

was started in 1952, and the Louisville Ballet

Louisville Ballet

The Louisville Ballet is a ballet school and company based in Louisville, Kentucky and is the official state ballet of The Commonwealth of Kentucky. More than 100,000 people attend the company's productions annually of which most are accompanied by the Louisville Orchestra...

was founded that same year, though it only achieved professional status in 1975. In 1956 the Kentucky Derby Festival

Kentucky Derby Festival

The Kentucky Derby Festival is an annual festival held in Louisville, Kentucky during the two weeks preceding the first Saturday in May, the day of the Kentucky Derby...

was started to celebrate the annual Kentucky Derby. The next year, in 1957, the St. James Court Art Show

St. James Court Art Show

The St. James Court Art Show, colloquially called the St. James Art Fair, or just St. James, is a popular free public outdoor annual arts and crafts show held since 1957 in the Old Louisville neighborhood of Louisville, Kentucky, in the St. James-Belgravia Historic District...

was started. Both these are still popular festivals in the region.

Decline in mid-century

Eight whiskey distilleries opened on 7th Street Road after the end of prohibition

Prohibition in the United States

Prohibition in the United States was a national ban on the sale, manufacture, and transportation of alcohol, in place from 1920 to 1933. The ban was mandated by the Eighteenth Amendment to the Constitution, and the Volstead Act set down the rules for enforcing the ban, as well as defining which...

, and Louisville attempted to annex them to increase its tax base

Tax

To tax is to impose a financial charge or other levy upon a taxpayer by a state or the functional equivalent of a state such that failure to pay is punishable by law. Taxes are also imposed by many subnational entities...

. Not wanting to pay city taxes, the whiskey companies persuaded the Kentucky General Assembly

Kentucky General Assembly

The Kentucky General Assembly, also called the Kentucky Legislature, is the state legislature of the U.S. state of Kentucky.The General Assembly meets annually in the state capitol building in Frankfort, Kentucky, convening on the first Tuesday after the first Monday in January...

to pass the Shively Bill, which made it much more difficult for Louisville to annex additional areas. The distilleries used Kentucky's existing laws (which favored the mostly rural communities in the state) to form a ½ square-mile city named Shively

Shively, Kentucky

Shively is a city in Jefferson County, Kentucky, United States. The population was 15,157 at the 2000 census. It is located southwest of Louisville, Kentucky and directly adjoins the larger city. Shively is centered around the junction of US 60 and the Dixie Highway.-History:Shively was first...

in 1938. Shively grew to include residential areas.

In 1946 the General Assembly passed a law allowing the formation of a Metropolitan Sewer District, and Louisville's Board of Aldermen approved its creation a few months later. With the expansion of sewer service outside of traditional city limits

City limits

The terms city limits and city boundary refer to the defined boundary or border of a city. The area within the city limits is sometimes called the city proper. The terms town limits/boundary and village limits/boundary mean the same as city limits/boundary, but apply to towns and villages...

and laws hindering Louisville's annexation attempts, areas outside of the city limits that were developed during the building boom after World War II

World War II

became cities in their own right. This status prevented their annexation by Louisville. As a result, Louisville's population figures leveled off. The incorporation of such several new communities contributed to the defeat of Louisville's attempt to merge with Jefferson County in 1956. Louisville continued fighting to annex land to grow.

For a variety of reasons, Louisville began to decline as an important city in the 1960s and 1970s. Highways built in the late 1950s facilitated movement by the expanding middle class to newer housing being developed in the suburb

Suburb

The word suburb mostly refers to a residential area, either existing as part of a city or as a separate residential community within commuting distance of a city . Some suburbs have a degree of administrative autonomy, and most have lower population density than inner city neighborhoods...

s. With the loss in population, the downtown area began to decline economically. Many formerly popular buildings became vacant. Even the previously strong Brown Hotel closed its doors in 1971 (although it later reopened). Fontaine Ferry Park

Fontaine Ferry Park

Fontaine Ferry Park was an amusement park in Louisville, Kentucky from 1905 to 1969. Located in Louisville's West End on , it offered over 50 rides and attractions, as well as a swimming pool, skating rink and theatre...

, Louisville's most popular amusement park

Amusement park

thumb|Cinderella Castle in [[Magic Kingdom]], [[Disney World]]Amusement and theme parks are terms for a group of entertainment attractions and rides and other events in a location for the enjoyment of large numbers of people...

during the early 20th century, closed in 1969 as people's tastes for entertainment changed.

The once-strong farmer's market, Haymarket

Haymarket (Louisville)

The Haymarket referred to an outdoor farmer's market in Louisville, Kentucky. The market occupied the block between Jefferson, Liberty, Floyd and Brook streets. A small section extended south down Floyd Street. It was established in 1891 on the site of the city's earliest rail station, belonging to...

, ceased operations in 1962 after 71 years of operation. The final death-knell for the Haymarket, already in decline due to changing economic trends, was the construction of an Interstate 65

Interstate 65

Interstate 65 is a major Interstate Highway in the United States. The southern terminus is located at an intersection with Interstate 10 in Mobile, Alabama, and its northern terminus is at an interchange with Interstate 90 , U.S. Route 12, and U.S...

ramp through the main part of the open-air market. Not only did interstates facilitate suburban living, they sliced through older city neighborhoods and often divided them irreversibly.

Another major (F4

Fujita scale

The Fujita scale , or Fujita-Pearson scale, is a scale for rating tornado intensity, based primarily on the damage tornadoes inflict on human-built structures and vegetation...

) tornado hit on April 3, 1974 as part of the Super Outbreak

Super Outbreak

The Super Outbreak is the second largest tornado outbreak on record for a single 24-hour period, just behind the tornado outbreak of April 25–28, 2011...

of tornadoes that struck 13 states. It covered 21 miles (33.8 km) and destroyed several hundred homes in the Louisville area but was only responsible for 2 deaths. It also caused extensive damage in Cherokee Park.

Despite these signs of decline, a number of activities were taking place that presaged the Louisville Renaissance of the 1980s.

Southeast Christian Church

Southeast Christian Church

Southeast Christian Church is located in Louisville, Kentucky and is an evangelical, Christian church. This Church is associated with the Christian churches and churches of Christ. Its Senior Minister, Dave Stone, assumed leadership of the church in 2006....

, today one of the largest megachurch

Megachurch

A megachurch is a church having 2,000 or more in average weekend attendance. The Hartford Institute's database lists more than 1,300 such Protestant churches in the United States. According to that data, approximately 50 churches on the list have attendance ranging from 10,000 to 47,000...

es in the U.S., was founded in 1962 with only 53 members. In 1964, Actors Theatre of Louisville

Actors Theatre of Louisville

Actors Theatre of Louisville is a performing arts theater located in downtown Louisville, Kentucky. It was founded in 1964 by Louisville native Ewel Cornett, local producer Richard Block and actor Ken Jenkins of Scrubs fame, and was designated the "State Theater of Kentucky" in 1974. It is run as a...

was founded. It was later designated the "State Theater of Kentucky" in 1974. It has created a strong regional theater.

In 1973, the racehorse Secretariat

Secretariat (horse)

Secretariat was an American Thoroughbred racehorse, that in 1973 became the first U.S. Triple Crown champion in 25 years, setting new race records in two of the three events in the Series—the Kentucky Derby , and the Belmont Stakes —records that still stand today.Secretariat was sired by Bold...

made the fastest time ever run in the Derby (at its present distance) at 1 minute 59⅖ seconds. Excitement over him raised interest in the Derby.

There were signs of revival in the 1970s. Throughout the decade, new buildings came under construction downtown, and many historic buildings were renovated. Louisville's public transport

Public transport

Public transport is a shared passenger transportation service which is available for use by the general public, as distinct from modes such as taxicab, car pooling or hired buses which are not shared by strangers without private arrangement.Public transport modes include buses, trolleybuses, trams...

ation, Transit Authority of River City

Transit Authority of River City

The Transit Authority of River City is the major public transportation provider for the Louisville, Kentucky, United States metro area, which includes parts of Southern Indiana. This includes the Kentucky suburbs of Oldham County, Bullitt County, Clark County, and Floyd County in southern Indiana...

, began operating a bus line

Bus

A bus is a road vehicle designed to carry passengers. Buses can have a capacity as high as 300 passengers. The most common type of bus is the single-decker bus, with larger loads carried by double-decker buses and articulated buses, and smaller loads carried by midibuses and minibuses; coaches are...

in 1974. And in 1981 the Falls of the Ohio was granted status as a Federal conservation area.

On the down side, in the early morning hours of February 13, 1981, sewer explosions

Louisville sewer explosions

The Louisville sewer explosions were a series of explosions that destroyed more than two miles of streets in Louisville, Kentucky, United States on February 13, 1981. The blasts were caused by the ignition of hexane vapors which had been illegally discharged from a Ralston-Purina soybean...

ripped through the southern part of Old Louisville

Old Louisville

and near the University of Louisville

University of Louisville

. The cause was traced back to chemical releases into the sewer system from a nearby manufacturing plant

Factory

A factory or manufacturing plant is an industrial building where laborers manufacture goods or supervise machines processing one product into another. Most modern factories have large warehouses or warehouse-like facilities that contain heavy equipment used for assembly line production...

.

Louisville continued to struggle during the 1980s in its attempt to redevelop and expand. It fought with other Jefferson County communities in two more failed attempts to merge with county government in 1982 and 1983. Barry Bingham, Jr.

Barry Bingham, Jr.

George Barry Bingham, Jr. was an American newspaper publisher and television and radio executive...

sold the family business Standard Gravure

Standard Gravure

Standard Gravure was a Louisville, Kentucky rotogravure printing company founded in 1922 by Robert Worth Bingham and owned by the powerful Bingham family. For decades, it printed the weekly The Courier-Journal Magazine as well as rotogravure sections for other newspapers as well as Parade...

in 1986, which sent the company into a major restructuring in the following years. The Courier-Journal
The Courier-Journal
The Courier-Journal, locally called "The C-J", is the main newspaper for the city of Louisville, Kentucky, USA. According to the 1999 Editor & Publisher International Yearbook, the paper is the 48th largest daily paper in the United States and the single largest in Kentucky.- Origins :The...

was one of the papers printed by Standard Gravure. On September 14, 1989, Joseph Wesbecker

Standard Gravure shooting

The Standard Gravure shooting occurred on September 14, 1989 when 47-year old Joseph T. Wesbecker, a pressman on disability for mental illness entered Standard Gravure, his former workplace, and killed eight people and injured twelve before committing suicide after a history of suicidal ideation...

, on medical leave due to mental illness and work-related stress, entered the Courier-Journal building and shot and killed eight employees, injuring another twelve before killing himself.

Civil Rights Movement

During the time of Civil Rights Movement in the late 1950s and through the 1960s, Louisville was affected, as it had maintained a segregated society. Civil rights groups had undertaken a variety of actions to challenge that. In addition, black neighborhoods had declined during the economic downturn of the city. Urban renewal efforts undertaken for ostensible improvements had adversely affected the center of their neighborhood.

After national civil rights legislation had passed in 1964 and 1965, energy continued among African Americans to push for social changes. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People

National Association for the Advancement of Colored People

The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, usually abbreviated as NAACP, is an African-American civil rights organization in the United States, formed in 1909. Its mission is "to ensure the political, educational, social, and economic equality of rights of all persons and to...

(NAACP) had for years had an office in the Parkland

Parkland, Louisville

Parkland is a neighborhood in Louisville, Kentucky, USA. Its boundaries are 34th Street on the west, West Broadway on the north, Woodland Avenue on the south and 26th Street on the east....

neighborhood, which had an African-American majority population. In Louisville, as in other cities, there was a political struggle between the NAACP and more militant activists associated with Black Power

Black Power

Black Power is a political slogan and a name for various associated ideologies. It is used in the movement among people of Black African descent throughout the world, though primarily by African Americans in the United States...

. The latter's attempt to organize people was one of the catalysts for the riot. In addition, feelings were raw because Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. had been assassinated less than two months before. On May 27, 1968 a group of 400 mostly African-Americans gathered for a protest in Parkland. They opposed possible reinstatement of a white officer involved in an incident where physical conflict had occurred in the arrest of two African-American men. The group was organized by the Black Unity League of Kentucky, known as BULK. BULK had announced that activist Stokely Carmichael

Stokely Carmichael

Kwame Ture , also known as Stokely Carmichael, was a Trinidadian-American black activist active in the 1960s American Civil Rights Movement. He rose to prominence first as a leader of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and later as the "Honorary Prime Minister" of the Black Panther Party...

was to come to Louisville to speak, but he had no such plans. When the crowd gathered, speakers spread rumors that Carmichael's plane had been purposely delayed; protesters got angry, and a disturbance began.

The crowd's tossing bottles and looting

Looting

Looting —also referred to as sacking, plundering, despoiling, despoliation, and pillaging—is the indiscriminate taking of goods by force as part of a military or political victory, or during a catastrophe, such as during war, natural disaster, or rioting...

forced the police to retreat. By midnight, rioters had looted several stores in Downtown Louisville

Downtown Louisville

Downtown Louisville is the largest central business district in the Commonwealth of Kentucky and the urban hub of the Louisville, Kentucky Metropolitan Area. Its boundaries are the Ohio River to the north, Hancock Street to the east, York and Jacob Streets to the south, and 9th Street to the west...

. Cars were overturned and some burned. Mayor Kenneth A. Schmied

Kenneth A. Schmied

Kenneth Allen Schmied , a Republican, served as Mayor of Louisville, Kentucky.Schmied was the son of a Swiss immigrant who sold coffee door to door and later owned a furniture store. Kenneth A...

ordered the 2,178 Kentucky National Guardsmen

Army National Guard

Established under Title 10 and Title 32 of the U.S. Code, the Army National Guard is part of the National Guard and is divided up into subordinate units stationed in each of the 50 states, three territories and the District of Columbia operating under their respective governors...

to help disperse the crowd. The mayor also issued a city-wide curfew. 472 arrests were made during the riots, two African-American teenage boys were killed, and over $200,000 in property damage was done. The National Guard remained in place until June 4, 1968. Following these events, the city's demographics changed dramatically; the city became more racially segregated by neighborhoods, and more middle-class people, of both races, moved to newer housing in the suburbs.

Despite the Supreme Court's ruling in Brown v. Board of Education in 1954, Louisville's public schools were still essentially segregated, especially as regional residential segregation

Residential Segregation

Residential segregation is the physical separation of cultural groups based on residence and housing, or a form of segregation that "sorts population groups into various neighborhood contexts and shapes the living environment at the neighborhood level."...

had become more pronounced due to other economic changes. In 1971 and 1972 the Kentucky Civil Liberties Union, Legal Aid Society

Legal Aid Society of Louisville

Legal Aid Society, Inc., originally incorporated as Legal Aid Society of Louisville, is a non-profit legal aid organization based in Louisville, Kentucky...

, and NAACP filed suit in federal court to desegregate the Louisville and Jefferson County school systems. The Kentucky Commission on Human Rights also filed suit asking that desegregation be achieved through merger of the Louisville, Jefferson County and Anchorage school systems, to overcome residential segregation and the inability of the city to expand by annexation and take in a more diverse area. By February 28, 1975, the state Board of Education ordered the merger of the Louisville and Jefferson County schools

Jefferson County Public Schools (Kentucky)

Jefferson County Public Schools is a public school district located in Jefferson County, Kentucky and operating all but one of the public schools in the county...

systems effective April 1, 1975.

On July 17, 1975, Judge James F. Gordon stipulated that a desegregation plan would be implemented at the beginning of the 1975–76 school year, to begin September 4, 1975. The school system used mandatory busing to distribute students to integrate the newly merged school systems. The students were bused according to the first initial of their last name and their grade level. The busing was to achieve certain percentages of racial diversity in schools regardless of where the students lived. In practical effects, the plan required black students to be bused up to 10 of their 12 years in school, and white students 2 of their 12 years. In 1978 the judge ended his supervision of the project, but the decree remained in effect in some places. The school system continued the busing system. In the mid 1980s, the school system restructured the plan to try to provide for more local schooling for students. Guidelines remained in effect for percentages of the student population based on ethnicity.

Revitalization efforts

From the 1980s until the present day, Louisville has experienced a regrowth in popularity and prosperity. This can be seen in the many changes in this period, including a great deal of downtown infrastructure.

Many cultural showcases were founded or expanded in this period. The Kentucky Center for the Arts

The Kentucky Center

The Kentucky Center for the Performing Arts, located in Louisville, is a major performing arts center in Kentucky.The Kentucky Center also hosts artworks by Alexander Calder, Joan Miró, John Chamberlain, Jean Dubuffet and others....

was officially dedicated in 1983. In 1984 the center hosted one of the U.S. presidential election debates between Ronald Reagan

Ronald Reagan

Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....

and Walter Mondale

Walter Mondale

Walter Frederick "Fritz" Mondale is an American Democratic Party politician, who served as the 42nd Vice President of the United States , under President Jimmy Carter, and as a United States Senator for Minnesota...

. Today the Center hosts many touring plays and performances by the Kentucky Opera and the Louisville Ballet. An IMAX

IMAX

IMAX is a motion picture film format and a set of proprietary cinema projection standards created by the Canadian company IMAX Corporation. IMAX has the capacity to record and display images of far greater size and resolution than conventional film systems...

theater was added to the Louisville Science Center

Louisville Science Center

The Louisville Science Center, previously known as the Louisville Museum of Natural History & Science, is Kentucky's largest hands-on science museum. Located in Louisville, Kentucky's "Museum Row" in the West Main District of downtown, the museum operates as a non-profit organization...

in 1988. Phase I of the Louisville Waterfront Park

Louisville Waterfront Park

Louisville Waterfront Park is a municipal park adjacent to the downtown area of Louisville, Kentucky and the Ohio River. Specifically, it is adjacent to Louisville's wharf and Riverfront Plaza/Belvedere, which are situated to the west of the park....

was completed in 1999, and Phase II was completed in 2004. Though originally built as a standard movie theater

Movie theater

A movie theater, cinema, movie house, picture theater, film theater is a venue, usually a building, for viewing motion pictures ....

in 1921, the Kentucky Theater

Kentucky Theater

The Kentucky Theater was a theater and performing arts center at 651 S. 4th St., located in the theatre district of downtown Louisville, Kentucky in the United States of America.Built in 1921, the building served for sixty years as a movie house...

was reopened in 2000 as a performing arts

Performing arts

The performing arts are those forms art which differ from the plastic arts insofar as the former uses the artist's own body, face, and presence as a medium, and the latter uses materials such as clay, metal or paint which can be molded or transformed to create some physical art object...

venue.

In 1988, the Louisville Falls Fountain

Louisville Falls Fountain

The Louisville Falls Fountain was intended as a major tourist attraction in Louisville, Kentucky. It was dedicated August 19, 1988, five days after the death of its benefactor, Barry Bingham, Sr. who, along with his wife, had donated $2.6 million towards the project and future upkeep...

, the tallest computerized fountain in the world, began operation on the Ohio River at Louisville. Its 420 feet (128 m) high spray (later reduced to 375 feet (114.3 m) due to energy costs) and fleur-de-lis

Fleur-de-lis

The fleur-de-lis or fleur-de-lys is a stylized lily or iris that is used as a decorative design or symbol. It may be "at one and the same time, political, dynastic, artistic, emblematic, and symbolic", especially in heraldry...

patterns graced Louisville's waterfront until the fountain was shut down in 1998. For a single decade Louisville enjoyed this unusual and distinctive landmark on its cityscape.

In communications, The Courier-Journal
The Courier-Journal
The Courier-Journal, locally called "The C-J", is the main newspaper for the city of Louisville, Kentucky, USA. According to the 1999 Editor & Publisher International Yearbook, the paper is the 48th largest daily paper in the United States and the single largest in Kentucky.- Origins :The...

, Louisville's primary local newspaper, was purchased by media giant Gannett in 1987. The Louisville Eccentric Observer
Louisville Eccentric Observer
The Louisville Eccentric Observer is a free weekly newspaper , distributed every Wednesday in over 800 locations throughout the Louisville, Kentucky area, including areas of southern Indiana...

(LEO), a popular alternative newspaper, was founded in 1990, and the Snitch Newsweekly
Snitch Newsweekly
Snitch was a free, alternative weekly newspaper published in parts of the United States covering crime and police news. Perhaps the most notable feature was the ZIP Code Crime Watch, which gave brief, usually "smart aleck" commentary on literally hundreds of items in the weekly police blotter,...

was established in the 1990s. Velocity
Velocity (newspaper)
Velocity was a free, weekly magazine published between December 3, 2003 and June 15, 2011, by The Courier-Journal of Louisville, Kentucky.The full-color tabloid was distributed at 1,800 locations in a 13-county area in Kentucky and Southern Indiana....

was later released by the Courier-Journal to compete with the LEO in 2003.

In 2003, the city of Louisville and Jefferson County merged into a single government named Louisville-Jefferson County Metro Government. This merger made Louisville the 16th or 27th most populous city in the U.S., depending on how the population is calculated. The change enabled consolidation of some services and activities to provide better government for the region.

New changes and growth continued in the city. The entertainment and retail district called Fourth Street Live!

Fourth Street Live!

Fourth Street Live! is a entertainment and retail complex located on 4th Street, between Liberty and Muhammad Ali Boulevard, in Downtown Louisville, Kentucky. It is owned and was developed by the Cordish Company; it was designed by Louisville architects, Bravura Corporation...

was opened in 2004, and the Muhammad Ali Center

Muhammad Ali Center

The Muhammad Ali Center, a museum and cultural center built as a tribute to the champion athlete and his values, is located in Louisville, Kentucky's "Museum Row" in the West Main District of downtown....

was opened in 2005. Between the 1990 Census and 2000 Census, Louisville's metro area population outgrew Lexington

Lexington-Fayette, KY Metropolitan Statistical Area

The Lexington-Fayette, KY Metropolitan Statistical Area is the 106th largest Metropolitan Statistical Area in the United States. It was originally formed by the United States Census Bureau in 1950 and consisted solely of Fayette County until 1980 when surrounding counties saw increases in their...

's by 149,415, and Cincinnati's by 23,278.

Preservation and presentation of Louisville history

See also: Louisville museums and interpretive centers covering regional history

Since 1884, The Filson Historical Society

The Filson Historical Society

The Filson Historical Society is a historical society located in the Old Louisville neighborhood of Louisville, Kentucky. The organization was founded in 1884 and named after early Kentucky explorer John Filson, who wrote The Discovery, Settlement, and Present State of Kentucke, which included one...

(originally named the Filson Club), with its extensive collections, has led the way in preserving Louisville's history. The University of Louisville

University of Louisville

and the Louisville Free Public Library

Louisville Free Public Library

The Louisville Free Public Library is the largest public library system in Kentucky. Officially opened in 1908, the library's main site resides south of Broadway in downtown Louisville. Additional branches were added over time, including the Western Colored Branch, which was the first...

have also maintained extensive historical collections.

Currently Louisville doesn't have a dedicated museum focused only on the history of the city, but various museums and historic homes present displays devoted to this history. Prominent among these locations include the Filson, Portland Museum

Portland Museum (Louisville)

The Portland Museum is a local history museum in Louisville, Kentucky. It details the history of the Portland neighborhood through several permanent and monthly exhibits.-History:...

, Historic Locust Grove

Historic Locust Grove

Historic Locust Grove is a 55-acre 18th century farm site and National Historic Landmark situated in eastern Jefferson County, Kentucky . The site is presently owned by the Louisville Metro government, and operated as a historic interpretive site by Historic Locust Grove, Inc.The main feature on...

, Falls of the Ohio State Park

Falls of the Ohio State Park

Falls of the Ohio State Park is a state park in Indiana. It is located on the banks of the Ohio River at Clarksville, Indiana, across from Louisville, Kentucky.The park is part of the Falls of the Ohio National Wildlife Conservation Area...

interpretive center (Clarksville, Indiana

Clarksville, Indiana

Clarksville is a town in Clark County, Indiana, United States, along the Ohio River as a part of the Louisville Metropolitan area. The population was 21,724 at the 2010 census. The town, once a home site to George Rogers Clark, was founded in 1783 and is the oldest American town in the Northwest...

), Howard Steamboat Museum

Howard Steamboat Museum

The Howard Steamboat Museum is located in Jeffersonville, Indiana, across from Louisville, Kentucky. Based in the old Howard home, it features items related to steamboat history....

(Jeffersonville, Indiana

Jeffersonville, Indiana

Jeffersonville is a city in Clark County, Indiana, along the Ohio River. Locally, the city is often referred to by the abbreviated name Jeff. It is directly across the Ohio River to the north of Louisville, Kentucky along I-65. The population was 44,953 at the 2010 census...

), Carnegie Center for Art & History (New Albany, Indiana

New Albany, Indiana

), and the Thomas D. Clark Center for Kentucky History

Kentucky Historical Society

The Kentucky Historical Society , established in 1836, is committed to helping people understand, cherish and share Kentucky's history. The KHS history campus, located in historic downtown Frankfort, Kentucky, includes the Thomas D. Clark Center for Kentucky History, the Old State Capitol and the...

(Frankfort

Frankfort, Kentucky

External links

Louisville Historic Landmarks and Preservation Districts Commission
Kentuckiana Heritage Consortium
Lewis and Clark in Kentucky
Louisville Historical League
Louisville history from RootsWeb
Thomas D. Clark Center for Kentucky History
Whirling Tigers of the Air: A Century of Louisville Tornadoes — Historical tornado damage images and narrative from the University of Louisville
University of Louisville
The University of Louisville is a public university in Louisville, Kentucky. When founded in 1798, it was the first city-owned public university in the United States and one of the first universities chartered west of the Allegheny Mountains. The university is mandated by the Kentucky General...

Photographic Archives
Historic Maps of Louisville/Jefferson County, Kentucky from the University of Louisville Libraries
Metro Mapper - National Register of Historic Places from the U of L Ekstrom Library
Louisville After the Bombings? - history of old building demolition

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.

Pre-Anglo-American settlement history (pre-1778)

Foundation and early settlement (1778–1803)

Antebellum

"Sold down the river"

Civil War

Post-Reconstruction

Early 20th century

Decline in mid-century

Civil Rights Movement

Revitalization efforts

Preservation and presentation of Louisville history

See also

Further reading

External links