Jacksonville

JACKSONVILLE

JACKSONVILLE, city located on the Saint Johns River twenty miles from the Atlantic Ocean in northeast Florida. French Huguenots settled in the area in 1564 and built Fort Caroline. The Spanish took control of the area the following year, and the English followed in the late eighteenth century. In 1822, settlers laid out a town named for Andrew Jackson. The city was incorporated in 1832 and served as a base for blockade-runners during the Civil War. A fire destroyed much of the city in 1901 but it was quickly rebuilt. In 2000, Jacksonville was Florida's largest incorporated city, with a land area of 765 square miles and a population of 735,617. The population of the metropolitan area was 1,121,580. African Americans were the largest racial minority in Jacksonville—25 percent of the population. Jacksonville's consolidation with Duval County in 1968 ended much duplication of urban services and provided political access for minorities. It also kept middle-income residents as taxpayers and voters, while attracting national corporations to relocate, providing jobs and tax revenues. Crime, drugs, teenage pregnancies, school dropouts, and homelessness were serious problems for the city in the 1990s. The U.S. Navy is Jacksonville's largest employer. Banking, insurance, finance, medicine, transportation, wholesale and retail trade, construction, and tourism are other major industries. The Jacksonville Jaguars expansion team in the National Football League began play in 1995 in an entirely new Gator Bowl. Downtown, the Jacksonville Landing and Riverwalk helped revitalize the waterfront. In 1995, a renaissance plan to include a new city hall and civic auditorium was under way, which by 2002 had resulted in a rebuilt Performing Arts Center, the Florida Theatre, and the Ritz Theatre, and had moved city hall to the St. James Building on Hemming Plaza. Historically, Jacksonville has been mainly a blue-collar city. In the 1980s, that image began to change with the establishment of new up-scale communities in Amelia Island and Ponte Verde, and the Professional Golf Association (PGA) Hall of Fame in adjacent Saint Johns County.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Martin, Richard A. A Quiet Revolution: Jacksonville-Duval County Consolidation and the Dynamics of Urban Political Reform. Jacksonville, Fla.: White Publishing, 1993.

Ward, James Robertson. Old Hickory's Town: An Illustrated History of Jacksonville. Jacksonville, Fla.: Florida Publishing, 1982.

James B. Crooks / a. g.

See also Frontier ; South, the: The New South ; Trading Posts .