Cincinnati
City in Ohio, United States From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Cincinnati (/ˌsɪnsɪˈnæti/ SIN-sin-AT-ee; nicknamed Cincy) is a city in and the county seat of Hamilton County, Ohio, United States.[10] Settled in 1788, the city is located on the northern side of the confluence of the Licking and Ohio rivers, the latter of which marks the state line with Kentucky. The population of Cincinnati was 309,317 in 2020, making it the third-most populous city in Ohio after Columbus and Cleveland and 64th in the United States. The city is the economic and cultural hub of the Cincinnati metropolitan area, Ohio's most populous metro area and the nation's 30th-largest with over 2.265 million residents.[11]
Cincinnati | |
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 Logo | |
| Nicknames: | |
| Motto(s): Juncta Juvant (Latin) "Strength in Unity" | |
 Interactive map of Cincinnati | |
  Cincinnati  Cincinnati  Cincinnati | |
| Coordinates: 39°06′00″N 84°30′45″W | |
| Country |  United States |
| State |  Ohio |
| County | Hamilton |
| Settled | 1788 |
| Incorporated (town) | January 1, 1802[2] |
| Incorporated (city) | March 1, 1820[3] |
| Named for | Society of the Cincinnati and Cincinnatus |
| Government | |
| • Type | Mayor–council |
| • Body | Cincinnati City Council |
| • Mayor | Aftab Pureval (D) |
| • City manager | Sheryl Long |
| Area | |
| • City | 79.64 sq mi (206.26 km2) |
| • Land | 77.91 sq mi (201.80 km2) |
| • Water | 1.72 sq mi (4.46 km2) |
| • Metro | 4,808 sq mi (12,450 km2) |
| Elevation | 742 ft (226 m) |
| Population (2020) | |
| • City | 309,317 |
| • Estimate (2023)[6] | 311,097 |
| • Rank | US: 64th |
| • Density | 3,969.98/sq mi (1,532.81/km2) |
| • Urban | 1,686,744 (US: 33rd) |
| • Urban density | 2,242.2/sq mi (865.7/km2) |
| • Metro | 2,265,051 (US: 30th) |
| • Demonym | Cincinnatian |
| GDP | |
| • Cincinnati (MSA) | $157.0 billion (2022) |
| Time zone | UTC−5 (EST) |
| • Summer (DST) | UTC−4 (EDT) |
| ZIP Codes | 452XX, 45999[8] |
| Area code | 513 and 283 |
| FIPS code | 39-15000[9] |
| GNIS feature ID | 1086201[5] |
| Website | cincinnati-oh |
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Throughout much of the 19th century, Cincinnati was among the top 10 U.S. cities by population. The city developed as a river town for cargo shipping by steamboats, located at the crossroads of the Northern and Southern United States, with fewer immigrants and less influence from Europe than East Coast cities in the same period. However, it received a significant number of German-speaking immigrants, who founded many of the city's cultural institutions. It later developed an industrialized economy in manufacturing. Many structures in the urban core have remained intact for 200 years; in the late 1800s, Cincinnati was commonly referred to as the "Paris of America" due mainly to ambitious architectural projects such as the Music Hall, Cincinnatian Hotel, and Roebling Bridge.[12]
Cincinnati has the twenty-eighth largest economy in the United States and the fifth largest in the Midwest, home to several Fortune 500 companies including Kroger, Procter & Gamble, and Fifth Third Bank.[13] It is home to three professional sports teams: the Cincinnati Reds of Major League Baseball; the Cincinnati Bengals of the National Football League; and FC Cincinnati of Major League Soccer; it is also home to the Cincinnati Cyclones, a minor league ice hockey team. The city's largest institution of higher education, the University of Cincinnati, was founded in 1819 as a municipal college and is now ranked as one of the 50 largest in the United States.[14] The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals is based in the city.
Cincinnati is the birthplace of William Howard Taft, the 27th President and 10th Chief Justice of the United States. Recently, Cincinnati has been named among the 100 most livable cities in the world, at number 88, and is on many Best Places to Live lists, including Livability.com and U.S. News & World Report. Forbes ranked Cincinnati as the 5th best city for young professionals in 2023.[15]
Etymology
Two years after the founding of the settlement then known as "Losantiville", Arthur St. Clair, the governor of the Northwest Territory, changed its name to "Cincinnati", possibly at the suggestion of the surveyor Israel Ludlow,[16] in honor of the Society of the Cincinnati.[17] St. Clair was at the time president of the Society, made up of Continental Army officers of the Revolutionary War.[18] The club was named for Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus, a dictator in the early Roman Republic who saved Rome from a crisis and then retired to farming because he did not want to remain in power, becoming a symbol of Roman civic virtue.[19][20][lower-alpha 1]
Early history
Cincinnati began in 1788 when Mathias Denman, Colonel Robert Patterson, and Israel Ludlow landed at a spot at the northern bank of the Ohio opposite the mouth of the Licking and decided to settle there. The original surveyor, John Filson, named it "Losantiville", a combination of syllables drawn from French and Latin words, intended to mean "town opposite the mouth of the Licking".[23][24] On January 4, 1790, St. Clair changed the name of the settlement to honor the Society of the Cincinnati.[25]
In 1811, the introduction of steamboats on the Ohio River opened up the city's trade to more rapid shipping, and the city established commercial ties with St. Louis, Missouri, and New Orleans downriver. Cincinnati was incorporated as a city on March 1, 1819.[26] Exporting pork products and hay, it became a center of pork processing in the region. From 1810 to 1830, the city's population nearly tripled, from 9,642 to 24,831.[27]
Construction on the Miami and Erie Canal began on July 21, 1825, when it was called the Miami Canal, related to its origin at the Great Miami River. The first section of the canal was opened for business in 1827.[28] In 1827, the canal connected Cincinnati to nearby Middletown; by 1840, it had reached Toledo.
Railroads were the next major form of commercial transportation to come to Cincinnati. In 1836, the Little Miami Railroad was chartered.[29][page needed] Construction began soon after, to connect Cincinnati with the Mad River and Lake Erie Railroad, and provide access to the ports of the Sandusky Bay on Lake Erie.[28][page needed]
During the time, employers struggled to hire enough people to fill positions. The city had a labor shortage until large waves of immigration by Irish and Germans in the late 1840s. The city grew rapidly over the next two decades, reaching 115,000 people by 1850.[18]
During this period of rapid expansion and prominence, residents of Cincinnati began referring to the city as the Queen City.[30]
Industrial development and Gilded Age
Cincinnati's location, on the border between the free state of Ohio and the slave state of Kentucky, made it a prominent location for slaves to escape the slave-owning south. Many prominent abolitionists also called Cincinnati their home during this period, and made it a popular stop on the Underground Railroad.[31] In 2004, the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center was completed along Freedom Way i