Jacksonville, Florida

Jacksonville, Florida

 

Jacksonville
City in the United States
Location
State Florida
County Duval County
Coordinates 30°19’N, 81°39’WL
General
Surface 2,265.30 km²
– country 1,935.88 km²
– water 329.42 km²
Residents
(April 1, 2020)
949,611
(491 inhabitant/km²)
Politics
Mayor Lenny Curry (R)
Website coj.net

According to Existingcountries, Jacksonville is a city in Florida, a southern US state. It is located in Duval County. Jacksonville is also known as The Bold New City of the South or The River City by the Sea. 949,611 people live in the city (2020), the metropolitan area is inhabited by more than 1.7 million people. This makes the city itself the largest in Florida, but the metropolitan area of ​​Miami is larger than the metropolitan area of ​​Jacksonville.

History

Drawing of the construction of Fort Caroline

Jacksonville was named for General Andrew Jackson, the territory’s first military governor.

The Timucuan Indians were the original inhabitants of this area. After that, the Spanish colonized the area in 1513 with the arrival of Juan Ponce de León. The French also came to what is now Jacksonville, and built Fort Caroline there in 1564. But they lost the area to the Spaniards just a year later. They built a settlement in St Augustine. In 1738 Fort Mose was established just north of St Augustine; the first settlement for freed black slaves in the US.

Florida became a US territory in 1821 and Jacksonville was founded a year later. This happened at Cowford, a hamlet on the St Johns River where cows were crossed. In the mid-1800s, Jacksonville was a popular wintering resort for the wealthy from the north. They called the city winter city in summerland: winter city in summerland. Tourists from all over came to Jacksonville to enjoy the warm climate.

In 1901 a large fire made its way through the streets of the center. Nothing remained of 2368 buildings. However, the fire later turned out to have also had an advantage: the center was now thoroughly renovated and modernised. During the Great Depression of the 1930s, Jacksonville also suffered. But after the Second World War, the city proved to be very resilient. In 1968, the city and county merged to form the largest city for miles around.

Geography

Topography

Jacksonville is located just off the east coast of Florida, in Duval County. The city is 1,144 km from Washington DC and 253 km from Florida’s capital, Tallahassee. The exact position is 30.33 degrees N and 81.65 WL. The area covers 1,964.95 km2 of land area and 314.23 km2 of water area (2.59% of the total area).

Jacksonville is located in the northeast corner of Florida, near the border with Georgia. It lies on the banks of the St. Johns River; the river flows 500 km north and empties into the Atlantic Ocean, at Mayport.

Climate

In January the average temperature is 11.3 °C, in July it is 27.6 °C. Annual average rainfall is 1303.5 mm (data based on the measurement period 1961-1990).

Demographics

In 1999, an estimated 695,900 people lived in the city (1990: 635,200 inhabitants). That’s nearly five times as much as in Florida’s capital, Tallahassee. The inhabitants are divided over about 267,100 families.

10.3 % of the population in Jacksonville is older than 65 and 26.2 % consists of single – person households. Unemployment stands at 3.3 % (2000 census figures).

About 4.2% of Jacksonville’s population is Hispanic and Hispanic, 29% of African origin and 2.8% of Asian origin.

The number of inhabitants increased from 635,042 in 1990 to 735,617 in 2000. By 2020 the number of inhabitants had increased to 949,311.

Board

The City of Jacksonville and Duval County merged in 1968, so Jacksonville’s board is made up of a single agency that governs the entirety of Duval County, with the exception of Atlantic Beach, Neptune Beach, Jacksonville Beach, and Baldwin.

Culture

Tourist attractions

Jacksonville is not only the largest city in Florida geographically, but also has the most inhabitants; more than twice as much as Miami (without suburbs). There are more than 14,000 hotel rooms and more than 1,000 restaurants.

Popular attractions are:

  • The more than 30 km long beach
  • Cummer Gallery of Art
  • Jacksonville Zoological Park
  • Museum of Science and History
  • Fort Caroline National Memorial
  • A concert by Jacksonville Symphony Orchestra
  • Jacksonville Municipal Stadium, home of the Jacksonville Jaguars

Sports teams

baseball:

  • The Jacksonville Suns

American Football:

  • Jacksonville Jaguars (NFL)

Trivia

  • Jacksonville was the Bible ‘s first port of entry
  • The city is home to the longest concrete funicular bridge in the Western Hemisphere (Napoleon Bonaparte Broward Bridge)
  • This is where the first recorded Christian prayer in the New World was spoken
  • It is the site of the oldest civilization in North America
  • The city has the oldest skyscraper in Florida (Dyal-Upchurch building)
  • This is where the bands Yellowcard, Shinedown and Lynyrd Skynyrd originated.

Nearby places

The figure below shows nearby places within 20 miles of Jacksonville.

Jacksonville

Atlantic Beach (24 km)

Baldwin (30km)

Bellair Meadowbrook Terrace (18 km)

Callahan (31 km)

Fruit Cove (25 km)

Jacksonville Beach (26 km)

Lakeside (23 km)

Nassau Village-Ratliff (26 km)

Neptune Beach (25 km)

Orange Park (17 km)

Palm Valley (29 km)

Sawgrass (31 km)

Born

  • Merian C. Cooper (1893–1973), pilot, officer, director, screenwriter and film producer (King Kong)
  • Edward Gourdin (1897-1966), long jumper
  • John Wheeler (1911-2008), theoretical physicist (known for participating in the Manhattan project (first atomic bomb) and for the ‘ black hole ‘)
  • Luther Dixon (1931-2009), songwriter and producer
  • Pat Boone (1934), singer
  • Scott McKenzie (1939-2012), singer
  • Bob Hayes (1942-2002), sprinter (Olympic champion) and American football player
  • Dan Peña (1945), entrepreneur and motivational speaker
  • Ronnie van Zant (1948-1977), singer and frontman of Lynyrd Skynyrd
  • Gary Rossington (1951), guitarist for Lynyrd Skynyrd
  • Allen Collins (1952-1990), guitarist for Lynyrd Skynyrd
  • Chandra Cheeseborough (1959), sprinter
  • Wendy Lawrence (1959), astronaut
  • Thom Tillis (1960), North Carolina Senator
  • Jay Barrs (1962), archer (Olympic champion)
  • Brad Mehldau (1970), jazz pianist, winner of an Edison for jazz
  • Ron DeSantis (1978), Florida Governor
  • Ma$e or Mase (1978), rapper (real name: Mason Durell Betha)
  • Emily Swallow (1979), actress
  • Ben Cooper (1982), singer/songwriter (Radical Face)
  • Bryan Lundquist (1985), swimmer
  • Ashley Greene (1987), actress of the Twilight Saga
  • Shea Holbrook (1990), racing driver
  • Djordje Mihailovic (1998), football player

Jacksonville, Florida