Your state's largest cities through history

[GAOnMyMind]

Which cities in your state have at one point or another held the title of the state's largest city?

[Trae]

San Antonio was the largest city for some time. Then it went to Galveston until the 1900 Hurricane. After that, Houston and Dallas flip-flopped for a few years. THen since 1920, Houston has been the largest city in Texas.

[davidals]

I think that is very imortant to consider in this discussion because 1) Annexation laws vary from state to state and 2) do these cities have to compete with their suburbs for population growth?

[wrldcoupe4]

And even with more restrictive laws, the same seems true to some degrees in SC and VA.

[Brent]

I like the idea of fixed boundaries. True, productive growth cannot be measured if the boundaries keep changing. Cities should fix what problems they have instead of looking for quick fixes like annexing land to increase one's tax base (or one's standing in largest cities rankings). It is too late for annexation to do anything for Richmond. Richmond doesn't need Henrico's aging inner suburbs, nor does it need Chesterfield's abandoned strip malls.

Cities and counties are very different animals. Seems reasonable to me to keep them separate entities. BTW I loved paying city AND county income taxes when I lived in Columbus, OH. Let the other 49 states keep their system. Ours works just fine.

[davidals]

^^

My VA reference was mainly with those exceptions in mind - Danville's big expansion in the 1990s, and the process that created some of the Tidewater cities.

[wrldcoupe4]

I like the idea of fixed boundaries. True, productive growth cannot be measured if the boundaries keep changing. Cities should fix what problems they have instead of looking for quick fixes like annexing land to increase one's tax base (or one's standing in largest cities rankings). It is too late for annexation to do anything for Richmond. Richmond doesn't need Henrico's aging inner suburbs, nor does it need Chesterfield's abandoned strip malls.

[DaltonGA]

Georgia 1860 (pop 1,057,286)

1) Savannah 22,292

2)Augusta 12,493

3)Atlanta 9,554

4)Columbus 9,021

5)Macon 8,247

Georgia 1870 (pop 1,184,109)

1)Savannah 28,235

2)Atlanta 21,729

3)Augusta 15,380

4)Macon 10,810

5)Columbus 7,401

These two census comparisons show just how rural Georgia was at the outbreak of the Civil War. Columbus is the only one of Georgia's largest cities to post a decline during the decade. Sherman burning Atlanta and marching through Macon and capturing Savannah did little to set these three cites back. Atlanta was just getting started, though it has been estimated the war boom has brought the population up to almost 40,000 before it was burnt, but I've also seen 30,000 and 35,000 as estimates also. Either way it was unofficially the largest city from 1863-1865. It didn't officially overtake Savannah until 1880 with 37,409 in Atlanta vs. 30,709 in Savannah.