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Founding
Founding of Leesburg
historic town within and the county seat of Loudoun County, Virginia, United States
- 12 October 1758
- North America
Founding
historic town within and the county seat of Loudoun County, Virginia, United States
Fetching the article from Wikipedia…
Leesburg is a town in and the county seat of Loudoun County, Virginia, United States. It is part of both the Northern Virginia region of the state and the Washington metropolitan area, including Washington, D.C., the nation's capital.
European settlement in the area began around 1740, when it was named for the Lee family, early colonial leaders of the town. Located in the far northeast of the state, in the War of 1812 it was a refuge for important federal documents evacuated from Washington, D.C., and in the Civil War, it changed hands several times.
Leesburg is 33 miles (53 km) west-northwest of Washington, D.C., along the base of Catoctin Mountain and close to the Potomac River. The town is the northwestern terminus of the Dulles Greenway, a private toll road that connects to the Dulles Toll Road at Dulles International Airport. Its population was 48,250 as of the 2020 Census and an estimated 48,908 in 2021. It is Virginia's largest incorporated town within a county.
Like much of Loudoun County, Leesburg has undergone considerable growth and development over the last 30 years, transforming from a small, rural Piedmont town to a suburban bedroom community for commuters to the national capital. Growth in the town and its immediate area to the east (Lansdowne/Ashburn) concentrates along the Dulles Greenway and State Route 7, which roughly parallels the Potomac River between Winchester to the west and Alexandria to the east.
Leesburg is home to professional soccer team Loudoun United FC of the USL Championship division who play their home matches at Segra Field.
The Federal Aviation Administration's Washington Air Route Traffic Control Center is in Leesburg.
Leesburg may have been named to honor the influential Thomas Lee or more generally for the Lee family. The name change was passed by an Act of Assembly in 1758. Francis Lightfoot Lee and Phillip Ludwell Lee, two of Thomas' sons, were early town trustees. The town is not named, as is sometimes thought, for Robert E. Lee (Thomas' great-grandnephew).
Prior to European settlement, the area around Leesburg was occupied by various Native American tribes.
In 1670, John Lederer (1670) testified that the entire Piedmont region had once been occupied by the "Tacci, alias Dogi", but that the Siouan tribes, driven from the northwest, had occupied it for 400 years.
In 1699, the Algonquian Piscataway (Conoy) moved to an island in the Potomac in the environs of Leesburg, and were there when the first known Europeans visited what is now Loudoun County.
What later became Old Carolina Road and is present-day U.S. Route 15 was a major route of travel between north and south for Native tribes. According to local historians, a pitched battle was fought near present-day Leesburg between the warring Catawba and Lenape tribes, neither of whom lived in the area.
A war party of Lenape had traveled from their home in New Jersey and neighboring regions, all the way to South Carolina to inflict a blow on their distant enemies, the Catawba. As they were returning northward, a party of Catawbas overtook them before they reached the Potomac River, but were defeated in a pitched battle 2 miles (3 km) south of Leesburg. The surviving Lenape buried their dead in a huge burial mound, and early settlers reported that they would return to this mound to honor their dead on the anniversary of this battle for many years thereafter. The date of this conflict is unknown, but it seems the Lenape and Catawba were at war in the 1720s and 1730s.
European settlement near Leesburg began in the late 1730s as Tidewater planters moved into the area from the south and east, establishing large farms and plantations. Many of the First Families of Virginia were among those to settle in the area, including the Carters, Lees and Masons. The genesis of Leesburg occurred sometime before 1755, when Nicholas Minor acquired land around the intersection of the Old Carolina Road and the Potomac Ridge Road on present-day Route 7 and established a tavern there.
Despite lack of growth around the tavern, upon Loudoun County's formation in 1757, Minor dubbed the sparse collection of buildings about his tavern "George Town" in honor of the reigning monarch of Great Britain. The village's prosperity changed the following year when the British Colonial Council ordered the establishment of the county courthouse at the crossroads.
Minor had a town laid out on the traditional Virginia plan of six criss-cross streets. On October 12, 1758, the Virginia General Assembly founded the town of Leesburg upon the 60 acres (0.24 km2) that Minor laid out. Leesburg was renamed to honor the influential Thomas Lee and not, as is popular belief, his son Francis Lightfoot Lee, who lived in Loudoun and brought up the bill to establish Leesburg. When the post office was established in Leesburg in 1803, the branch was named "Leesburgh"; the "h" persisted until 1894.
During the War of 1812, Leesburg served as a temporary haven for the United States government and its archives, including the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution and portraits of early American leaders, including Benjamin Franklin, when it was forced to flee Washington in the face of the British Army. When reconstruction began on the United States Capitol, Potomac marble from quarries just south of Leesburg was used.
Early in the American Civil War, Leesburg was the site of the Battle of Ball's Bluff, a small but significant Confederate victory. The battlefield, along the Potomac River 2 miles (3 km) northeast of the town center, is marked by one of America's smallest national cemeteries. The town frequently changed hands over the course of the war as both armies traversed the area during the Maryland and Gettysburg campaigns.
The Battle of Mile Hill was fought just north of the town prior to its occupation by Robert E. Lee in September 1862. Leesburg also served as a base of operations for Col. John S. Mosby and his partisan Raiders. The Loudoun County Courthouse is among the few courthouses in Virginia that was not burned during the Civil War; the present one was built in 1894.
In 1889, a 14-year-old black American, Orion Anderson, was killed by a white mob at the town's freight depot; his murder would be the second of three recorded lynchings in Loudoun County, Virginia, between 1880 and 1902.
In the 20th century, Leesburg was the home of World War II General George C. Marshall, architect of the famous Marshall Plan that helped re-build Europe after the war, and radio personality Arthur Godfrey, who donated land for the town's first airport.
Leesburg continued to serve as the center of government and commerce for Loudoun County. The town's historic district was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1970 and cited as one of the best preserved and most picturesque downtowns in Virginia.
In the 21st century, Downtown merchants have recently labeled themselves "Loudoun's Original Town Center", largely in response to the growing number of mixed-use shopping areas in proximity. Leesburg has served Loudoun's county seat continuously since the county's formation in 1757.
The Leesburg area contains twenty-one entries on the National Register of Historic Places, including:
At least sixty-three historic markers are located in and near Leesburg.
Leesburg is located northeast of the center of Loudoun County, Virginia, at 39°6′56″N 77°33′52″W / 39.11556°N 77.56444°W (39.1155, −77.5644), It is part of the northern Virginia Piedmont and sits at the base of the easternmost chain of the Blue Ridge Mountains, Catoctin Mountain. The town lies in the Culpeper Basin (an inland sea during the Jurassic period) and is adjacent to the valley of the Potomac River, so that the local relief is less pronounced than in other Virginia Piedmont towns. Elevation in town ranges from about 350 to 400 feet (110 to 120 m), with the ridge of Catoctin Mountain rising to 670 feet (200 m) just west of the town limits. The Town Branch of Tuscarora Creek passes through the center of town, flowing east to Goose Creek, a tributary of the Potomac.
According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has a total area of 12.4 square miles (32 km2), of which 0.06 square miles (0.16 km2), or 0.54%, are water.
As of the 2020 census, Leesburg had a population of 48,250. The median age was 35.6 years. 26.8% of residents were under the age of 18 and 9.4% of residents were 65 years of age or older. For every 100 females there were 95.5 males, and for every 100 females age 18 and over there were 92.6 males age 18 and over.
99.6% of residents lived in urban areas, while 0.4% lived in rural areas.
There were 16,184 households in Leesburg, of which 42.4% had children under the age of 18 living in them. Of all households, 57.7% were married-couple households, 14.8% were households with a male householder and no spouse or partner present, and 21.9% were households with a female householder and no spouse or partner present. About 20.5% of all households were made up of individuals and 5.6% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older.
There were 16,699 housing units, of which 3.1% were vacant. The homeowner vacancy rate was 0.6% and the rental vacancy rate was 4.8%.
According to the 2010 census, there were 42,616 people including 14,441 households, and 10,522 families residing in the town. The population density was 3,673 inhabitants per square mile (1,418/km2). There were 15,119 housing units at an average density of 1,220.2 per square mile (471.1/km2). The racial makeup of the town was 71.1% White, 9.5% African American, 0.4% Native American, 7.1% Asian, 0.0% Pacific Islander, 7.5% from other races, and 4.3% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 17.4% of the population.
Of all households, 44.4% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 57.8% were married couples living together, 10.5% had a female householder with no husband present, and 27.1% were non-families. 21.1% were made up of individuals, and 4.9% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.93 and the average family size was 3.42.
By age, the population was 30.7% under the age of 18, 5.5% from 18 to 24, 32.9% from 25 to 44, 23.4% from 45 to 64, and 6.1% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 33.3 years. For every 100 females, there were 95.7 males. For every 100 females aged 18 and over, there were 93.6 males.
The median income of the households in the town was $68,861, and the median income of the families was $78,111 (these figures had risen to $87,346 and $105,260 respectively as of a 2007 estimate). Males had a median income of $51,267 versus $35,717 for females. The per capita income for the town was $30,116. About 2.4% of families and 3.6% of the population were below the poverty line, including 3.8% of those under age 18 and 8.2% of those age 65 or over.
Leesburg has four public high schools operated by Loudoun County Public Schools: Loudoun County High School, Heritage High School, Tuscarora High School, and Riverside High School.
Leesburg is also served by several private schools, including Providence Academy, a K–8 non-denominational Christian school; Evergreen Christian School, a 9–12 non-denominational Christian school; and pre-K-8 Loudoun Country Day School.
The Leesburg Volunteer Fire Company provides fire protection services. The Loudoun County Volunteer Rescue Squad provides rescue and emergency medical services. Both the fire company and rescue squad are volunteer organizations supplemented with partial staffing from the Loudoun County Department of Fire, Rescue and Emergency Management. The fire company can trace its roots back to 1803; the rescue squad was formed in 1952.
Leesburg is served by a town police department. The Leesburg Police Department (LPD) has an authorized strength of 90 sworn officers and provides 24/7 patrol service to the town, as well as handling criminal investigations, traffic control, and special operations within the town. The department is completely separate from the Loudoun County Sheriff's Office, which is Loudoun County's primary law enforcement agency and provides security for the courthouse in Leesburg. The LPD was formed in 1758.
Text from the Wikipedia article “Leesburg, Virginia”, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.