When was your city incorporated?

[ironchapman]

When was your city incorporated?

Atlanta was in 1847.

Douglasville was in 1875.

[CtownMikey]

Cranston "C-town" 1754

[PghUSA]

PITTSBURGH, PA.

Settled circa 1748

Founded and Incorporated in 1758

Graduated from a "borough" to a "city" in 1816

Declared a "Charter City" in 1974 (Home Rule granted from Harrisburg)

[ironchapman]

Ft. Duquesne was it's original name, then Ft. Pitt after Britain's Prime Minister William Pitt in the late 1700's.

Am I right?

Nice city city seal.

Have you posted it in my Seal/Flag forum in the photos section?

[PghUSA]

Iron thats right, lots (even around here) believe we were from the first French and then George Washington came with the British to take us down the path of America instead of Quebec. In fact the area was torn between the French and English from the 1710s up until 1758 when the British drove the French to Quebec permanetly. The first fortification was actually British in 1754 young George Washington was there in the early 1750s on diplomatic missions with area traders and indian chiefs. The French redoubled efforts in the area and ran off the British Garrison Washington included, southeast of the city was Washington's ONLY military defeat in his whole commander career! When the fatally wounded Gen. Braddock fell Washington took command and got routed by the French and Indians. Washington also was this close to getting scapled and hung by the French in what became Pittsburgh by being accused of firing on a French Officer (don't remember if he actually did or actually killed him). He also back in the late 1740s or very early 1750s before the French were much of a power on the forks, took a raft across the frozen Allegheny River about a mile up from the head of the Ohio River and barely missed capsizing and drowning in the ice--a lesson that served him very well later in life when he made the surprise attack on the Hessians by crossing the icy Delware River during that famous Revolutionary War painting!

The British and Virginian "Ohio Company" lost control shortly after they built their fortification in 1754 to the French.

Fort Duquesne--named after the Governor of all New France at the time (from Louisiana to St. Louis to Detriot to Quebec)--was built in its place and lasted from 1754 to 1758 when it was scuttled by the French on knowing a superior British Force with Gen. Forbes was at their gates.

Fort Pitt was built in 1758 as the most expensive and most advanced Fortification the world has ever known up until that time--

--and for good reason.

What Americans know of as the "French and Indian War" some conflict on the edge of cilivization way before American history really began in 1776, the world knows as the "Seven Years War" and some say "The First World War". The conflict was pivitol in world history, it ushered in the fall of the French monarchy, the rise of the British Empire when compared to the old French Empire, Napoleon and yes even the American Revolution (by making the colonists feel more independent of the British b/c they could fight for themselves while at the same time nearly bankrupting the British and forcing the issue of stamp taxes and tea taxes).

There were other smaller "forts" or more aptly garrisons as well in and around the point. Right before the Revolutionary War broke out and almost 20 years since the French were driven out and thus the Indians pacificed some (but not all) Virginia and Pennsylvania were battling it out for control of the forks. If you realize that W. Va. with Whelling and Weirton etc. just to the west and along the Ohio River was part of Virginia up until the civil war, then Virginia's interestes in the forks were massive. What finally settled the question was the outbreak of war with England and although the Virginians were more passionate on the cause of getting Pittsburgh pulled into their sphere, Pennsylvanians from the east eventually outnumbered them and by 1783 at war's end it was bascially a moot point. Forts also played a role in the WORLD'S VERY FIRST KEGGER lol, as well as the world's very first "Constitional Test" the Whiskey Rebellion of the early 1790s, who's home base was just south of Pittsburgh along today's Steel Valley. Kentucky's Famous Whiskey and Moonshine were all exiled Pittsburghers fresh off the Whiskey Rebellion--driven out by the feds during the Whiskey Rebellion, just got on the boat and sailed down the Ohio till there weren't any more Whitemen.

Anyways enough history lesson for one day .

I am interested in other cities founding as well as the stories behind them

[ironchapman]

I'll post some of ATL's history when I find it. Thanks for the info, PghUSA!

Of course we all know of Sherman's burning of it, but there is much more behind it, too.

[PghUSA]

what surprised me was that Atlanta wasn't the original capitol of Georgia, Miledgville (sp) was until a few years After the Civil War, guess after it was sacked by Sherman it kind of withered away? Before that a town outside of Savannah. For the colonial period I could understand the Savannah area but always thought it moved directly to Atlanta especially by the time of the civil war, with all the romance and legend of the "Gone with the wind" etc. Just surprised me more then anything especially because so many consider it the "capitol of the south" today.

[ironchapman]

threadHere's a link to a in GA's forum that has all of GA's previous capitals.

Milledgeville was never a big town to begin with.