History of Louisville, Kentucky

The geology of the Ohio River, with but a single series of rapids halfway in its length from the confluence of the Monongahela and Allegheny rivers to its union with the Mississippi, made it inevitable that a town would grow on the site. Louisville, Kentucky was chartered in the late 18th century. From its early days on the frontier, it quickly grew to be a major trading and distribution center in the mid 19th century, important industrial city in the early 20th, declined in the mid 20th century, before revitalizing in the late 20th century as a culturally-focused mid-sized American city.

The history of Louisville, Kentucky spans a bit over two centuries since the latter part of the 18th century. Prior to arrival of Europeans, the region was depopulated from the Beaver Wars of the 17th century, and no permanent Native American settlements existed in the area. It was used as hunting grounds by northern Shawnee and southern Cherokee. The area's geography and location on the Ohio River attracted people from the earliest times. The city is located at the Falls of the Ohio River, then a part of Kentucky County, Virginia. The rapids created a barrier to river travel, and settlements grew up at this portage point. The earliest European settlements were during the latter stages of the American Revolutionary War by Virginian soldiers under George Rogers Clark, first at Corn Island in 1778, then Fort-on-Shore and Fort Nelson on the mainland. The town was chartered in 1780 and named Louisville in honor of King Louis XVI of France. That year it received an influx of 301 settlers.

In 2003, the city of Louisville merged with Jefferson County to become Louisville-Jefferson Metro. As of the 2010 census, it is the largest city in the state of Kentucky, the second largest on the Ohio River, and 29th largest city in the nation.

Notable residents of the city have included inventor Thomas Edison, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis, boxing legend Muhammad Ali, newscaster Diane Sawyer, actors Victor Mature, Ned Beatty and Tom Cruise, actresses Sean Young and Jennifer Lawrence, singer Nicole Scherzinger, R&B singer Bryson Tiller, rapper Jack Harlow, the Speed family (including U.S. Attorney General James Speed and Abraham Lincoln's close friend Joshua Fry Speed), the Bingham family, industrialist/politician James Guthrie, U.S. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, and contemporary writers Hunter S. Thompson and Sue Grafton.

Notable events occurring in the city include the largest exhibition installation to date (in 1883) and first large space lit by Edison's light bulb, and the first library in the South made accessible to African Americans. Medical advances included the 1999 first human hand transplant in the United States and the first self-contained artificial heart transplant in 2001.

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

There was a continuous indigenous human occupation of the area that became Louisville from at least 1,000 BCE until roughly 1650 CE, when the Beaver Wars resulted in depopulation of much of the Ohio River region. The Iroquois maintained this area as a hunting ground by conquest.

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 what is now the Louisville International Airport area. People of the Adena culture 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 and Mississippian cultures, which were active from 1,000 AD until about 1650. The Louisville area was on the eastern border of the Mississippian culture, which extended through the Mississippi Valley and its tributaries. Regional chiefdoms built dense villages and cities characterized by extensive earthwork mounds arranged around central plazas.

When European 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 from the north and Cherokee from the south.

The account of the first European to visit the area, the French colonizer, René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle in 1669, is disputed and not supported by facts. La Salle travelled along the St. Lawrence River to Lake Ontario, then to Lake Erie. The two priests traveling with his party departed the group at that point, and the written documentation of the expedition apparently ceased. Reports of what occurred differ, including abandonment of the journey due to illness, or traveling onward but not to the Ohio River. La Salle did not claim to discover the Ohio River on that voyage nor travel to the falls (of the Ohio). The "discovery" of the Louisville area in 1669 is thus perhaps better assigned to myth or legend. Subsequently, La Salle explored areas of the Mississippi river valley and lower Great Lakes region from the Gulf of Mexico up to modern-day Canada, claiming much of this land for France.

In 1751, the Maryland colonist Christopher Gist explored areas along the Ohio River. Following the defeat of France in the French and Indian War (part of the Seven Years' War in Europe), it ceded control of its territory east of the Mississippi River to Britain.

In 1769, American pioneer Daniel Boone created a trail from North Carolina to Tennessee. He spent the next two years exploring Kentucky. In 1773, Captain Thomas Bullitt led the first exploring party into Jefferson County, surveying land on behalf of Virginians who had been awarded land grants for their service in the French and Indian War. In 1774, James Harrod began constructing Fort Harrod in Kentucky. However, battles with the Native American tribes established in the area forced the American settlers to retreat. They returned the following year, as Boone built the Wilderness Road and established Fort Boonesborough at a site near Boonesborough, Kentucky. The Native Americans allocated a tract of land between the Ohio River and the Cumberland River for the Transylvania Land Company. In 1776, the colony of Virginia 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 established the first American settlement in the vicinity of modern-day Louisville in 1778, during the American Revolutionary War. He was conducting a campaign against the British in areas north of the Ohio River, then called the Illinois Country. Clark organized a group of 150 soldiers, known as the Illinois Regiment, after heavy recruiting in Virginia and Pennsylvania. On May 12, they set out from Redstone, today's Brownsville, Pennsylvania, 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 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 an initial settlement on what came to be called Corn Island, clearing land, and building cabins and a springhouse. On June 24, Clark took his soldiers and left to begin their military campaign. The first local government was established almost immediately. The first Trustees were selected in April of 1779, as part of this transition, with the first board consisting of seven men – William Harrod, Richard Chenoweth, Edward Bulger, James Patton, Henry French, Marsham Brashear, and Simon Moore. In May 1779, at the request of Clark, the settlers crossed the river and established the first permanent settlement on the mainland. By April, they called it "Louisville", in honor of King Louis XVI of France, whose government and soldiers aided colonists in the Revolutionary War. Today, George Rogers Clark is recognized as the European-American founder of Louisville; many landmarks have been named for 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. The initial fort, at the northern tip of today's 12th street, was called Fort-on-Shore. In response to the threat of British attacks, particularly Bird's invasion of Kentucky, a larger fort called Fort Nelson was built north of today's Main Street between Seventh and Eighth streets, covering nearly an acre. The GB￡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. 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 and then- Governor Thomas Jefferson approved the town charter of Louisville on May 1. Clark recruited early Kentucky pioneer James John Floyd, 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. Louisville was the county seat.

Also, during 1780, three hundred families migrated to the area, the town's first fire department was established, and the first street plan of Louisville was laid out by Willian Pope. Daniel Brodhead opened the first general store here in 1783. He became the first to move out of Louisville's early forts. Jonathan Cessna built the first house in newly platted Louisville. 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 log cabin. By this time, Louisville contained 63 clapboard finished houses, 37 partly finished, 22 uncovered houses, and over 100 log cabins. Shippingport, 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 did not grow as rapidly as Lexington in central Kentucky. Factors were the threat of Indian attacks (ended in 1794 by the Battle of Fallen Timbers), a complicated dispute over land ownership between John Campbell and the town's trustees (resolved in 1785), and Spanish policies restricting American trade and travel down the Mississippi to New Orleans