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Columbus, Muscogee County, Georgia, USA



 


Notizen:
Wikipedia 2016:

Columbus is a city in the U.S. state of Georgia and is the county seat of Muscogee County, with which it is consolidated. According to the 2013 estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau, Columbus has a population of 202,824 residents, with 316,554 in the greater Columbus-Phenix City metropolitan area. The metro area joins the nearby Alabama cities of Auburn and Opelika to form the Columbus-Auburn-Opelika Combined Statistical Area, which has an estimated population of 501,649. Columbus is directly across the Chattahoochee River from Phenix City, Alabama. Situated at the heart of the Chattahoochee Valley, Columbus is Georgia's second-largest city and fourth-largest metropolitan area.

Columbus lies 100 miles (160 km) southwest of Atlanta. Fort Benning, home of the United States Army Infantry School and a major employer, is located south of the city in Chattahoochee County. Columbus is home to museums and tourism sites, including the National Infantry Museum, dedicated to the United States Army's Infantry Branch, as well as the longest urban whitewater rafting course in the world.

History:

Founded in 1828 by an act of the Georgia Legislature, Columbus was situated at the beginning of the navigable portion of the Chattahoochee River and on the last stretch of the Federal Road before entering Alabama. The city was named for Christopher Columbus, its founders likely influenced by the writings of Washington Irving. The plan for the city was drawn up by Dr. Edwin L. DeGraffenried, who placed the town on a bluff overlooking the river. Across the river, where Phenix City, Alabama is now located, Creek Indians lived until their removal in 1836.

The river served as Columbus's connection to the world, particularly connecting plantations with the international cotton market via New Orleans and ultimately Liverpool, England. The city's commercial importance increased in the 1850s with the arrival of the railroad. In addition, textile mills began springing up along the river, bringing industry to an area reliant upon agriculture. By 1860, the city was one of the more important industrial centers of the South, earning it the nickname "the Lowell of the South" in deference to the industrial textile mill town in Massachusetts which is also along a river.

When the Civil War broke out in 1861, the industries of Columbus expanded their production and Columbus became one of the most important centers of industry in the Confederacy. During the war, Columbus ranked second to Richmond in the manufacture of supplies for the Confederate army. In addition to textiles, the city had an ironworks, a sword factory, and a shipyard for the Confederate Navy.

Unaware of Lee's surrender to Grant and the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, Union and Confederates clashed in the Battle of Columbus, Georgia, on Easter Sunday, April 16, 1865, when a Union detachment under General James H. Wilson attacked the city and burned many of the industrial buildings. The inventor of Coca-Cola, Dr. John Stith Pemberton, was wounded in this battle. The owner of America's last slave ship, Col. Charles Augustus Lafayette Lamar, was also killed here. A historic marker has been erected in Columbus marking the battle by Wilson's troops as the "Last Land Battle in the War from 1861 to 1865."

Reconstruction began almost immediately and prosperity followed. Factories such as the Eagle and Phenix Mills were revived and the industrialization of the town led to rapid growth; the city outgrew its original plan. The Springer Opera House was built on 10th Street, attracting such notables as Oscar Wilde. The Springer is now the official State Theater of Georgia.

By the time of the Spanish–American War, the city saw much modernization, including the addition of trolleys extending to outlying neighborhoods such as Rose Hill and Lakebottom, and a new water works. Mayor Lucius Chappell also brought a training camp for soldiers to the area. This training camp named Camp Benning would grow into present-day Fort Benning, named for General Henry L. Benning, a native of the city.

In the spring of 1866 the Ladies Memorial Association of Columbus passed a resolution to set aside one day annually to memorialize the Confederate dead. The secretary of the association, Mrs. Charles J. (Mary Ann) Williams was directed to author a letter inviting the ladies of every Southern state to join them in the observance. The letter was written in March 1866 and was sent to all of the principal cities in the South, including Atlanta, Macon, Montgomery, Memphis, Richmond, St. Louis, Alexandria, Columbia, and New Orleans.

The date for the holiday was selected by Elizabeth "Lizzie" Rutherford Ellis. She chose April 26, the first anniversary of Confederate General Johnston's final surrender to Union General Sherman at Bennett Place, North Carolina. For many in the South, that act marked the official end of the Civil War.

In 1868, General John A. Logan, commander in chief of the Union Civil War Veterans Fraternity called the Grand Army of the Republic (GAR), launched the Memorial Day holiday that is currently observed in the entire United States. According to General Logan's wife, he emulated the practices of Confederate Memorial Day. She wrote that Logan "said it was not too late for the Union men of the nation to follow the example of the people of the South in perpetuating the memory of their friends who had died for the cause they thought just and right."

With the expansion of the city, the need for a university saw the establishment of Columbus College, a two-year institution which would later grow into Columbus State University, now a comprehensive center of higher learning.

The city became consolidated in 1971 and became the first of its kind in Georgia (and one of only 16 in the U.S. at the time).

As the city has turned from its initial industry of textiles, it has provided a home for other prominent industries including the headquarters for Aflac, Synovus, TSYS and Carmike Cinemas.

During the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, urban blight, white flight, and prostitution were serious problems in much of downtown Columbus and adjacent neighborhoods. Early efforts to halt the gradual deterioration of downtown began with the saving and restoration of the Springer Opera House in 1965. With the revitalization of the Springer and its subsequent designation as the State Theatre of Georgia, a historic preservation movement was sparked and various historic districts were established in and around downtown. Through the late 1960s and early 1970s, large neighborhoods were built to accompany the soldiers coming back from the Vietnam War and for over from Ft. Benning. These range from Wesley woods to Leesburg to Brittney and Willowbrook and the high end Sears woods and Windsor park. Large tracts of blighted areas were cleaned up and a modern Columbus Consolidated Government Center was constructed in the city center. A significant period of urban renewal and revitalization followed in the mid to late 1990s.

With these improvements, residents and businesses began moving back to formerly blighted areas. Examples of these municipal projects including the construction of a softball complex which hosted the 1996 Olympic softball competition, construction of the Chattahoochee RiverWalk along the Chattahoochee River, construction of the National Civil War Naval Museum at Port Columbus, construction of the Coca-Cola Space Science Center, the expansion of the Columbus Museum, and road improvements to include a new downtown bridge crossing the Chattahoochee River to Phenix City. During the late 1990s, commercial activity expanded north of downtown along the I-185 corridor.

Ort : Geographische Breite: 32.4609764, Geographische Länge: -84.98770939999997


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1 Dominiak / Thielen  4 Mrz 1942Columbus, Muscogee County, Georgia, USA F48769