Founding
independent city in Virginia, United States
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Norfolk ( NOR-fək) is an independent city in the U.S. commonwealth of Virginia. It had a population of 238,005 at the 2020 census, making it the third-most populous city in both the Hampton Roads metropolitan area and in Virginia, after neighboring cities Virginia Beach and Chesapeake, as well as the 101st-most populous city in the United States. The city holds a strategic position as the historical, urban, financial, and cultural center of the Hampton Roads area (sometimes called "Tidewater"), which has more than 1.8 million inhabitants and is the 37th-largest metropolitan area in the U.S.
Norfolk was established in 1682 as a colonial seaport. Strategically located at the confluence of the Elizabeth River and the Chesapeake Bay, it quickly developed into a major center for trade and shipbuilding. During the American Revolution and War of 1812, its port and naval facilities made it a critical military target. Norfolk's prominence grew in the 20th century with the expansion of the U.S. Navy, particularly through the establishment of Naval Station Norfolk in 1917, which remains the world's largest naval base.
Norfolk is an important contributor to the Port of Virginia and houses one of NATO's two Strategic Command headquarters. It is home to Maersk Line, Limited, which manages the world's largest fleet of US-flag vessels. The city has numerous cultural institutions including the Nauticus maritime museum, Chrysler Museum of Art, and Virginia Zoo. Norfolk has many miles of riverfront and bayfront areas, including beaches on the Chesapeake Bay.
When the South Hampton Roads portion of the shire was separated, Thoroughgood suggested the name of his birthplace for the newly formed New Norfolk County. One year later, it was divided into two counties, Upper Norfolk and Lower Norfolk (the latter now incorporated into the City of Norfolk), chiefly on Thoroughgood's recommendation. This area of Virginia became known as the place of entrepreneurs, including men of the Virginia Company of London.
Norfolk developed in the late-seventeenth century as a "Half Moone" fort was constructed and 50 acres (200,000 m2) were acquired from local natives of the Powhatan Confederacy in exchange for 10,000 pounds of tobacco. The House of Burgesses established the "Towne of Lower Norfolk County" in 1680.
Norfolk was incorporated in 1705. In 1730, a tobacco inspection site was located here. According to the Tobacco Inspection Act, the inspection was "At Norfolk Town, upon the fort land, in the County of Norfolk; and Kemp's Landing, in Princess Anne, under one inspection." In 1736 George II granted it a royal charter as a borough. It was an important port for exporting goods to the British Isles and beyond.
After the American Revolution forced the Royal Governor of Virginia, John Murray, 4th Earl of Dunmore, to flee from Williamsburg, he made Norfolk the new capital of Virginia in 1775. Norfolk's 6,250 residents were primarily Loyalist because the British government had granted trade monopolies to many of their businesses. After losing at the Battle of Great Bridge that December, Lord Dunmore partially destroyed the city with naval cannonading. On January 16, 1776, the Patriots' Fourth Virginia Convention agreed to destroy most remaining homes to prevent Dunmore from using the city to amass British troops and runaway slaves.
Ultimately, Colonel Woodford drove Dunmore into exile, ending more than 168 years of British rule in Virginia. Only the walls of Saint Paul's Episcopal Church survived the bombardment and subsequent fires. A cannonball from the bombardment (fired by the Liverpool) remains within the wall of Saint Paul's.
When the British occupied Norfolk, Thomas Jefferson ordered its destruction by fire. Following recovery from the Revolutionary War's burning, Norfolk and its citizens struggled to rebuild. In 1804, another serious fire along the city's waterfront destroyed some 300 buildings and the city suffered a serious economic setback. During the War of 1812, British forces launched an unsuccessful raid against Norfolk.
The American Colonization Society proposed to "repatriate" free blacks and freed slaves to Africa by establishing the new colony of Liberia and paying for transportation. But most African Americans wanted to stay in their birthplace of the United States and achieve freedom and rights there. For a period, many emigrants to Liberia from Virginia and North Carolina embarked from the port of Norfolk. Joseph Jenkins Roberts, a free person of color native to Norfolk, emigrated via the American Colonization Society and later was elected as the first president of Liberia, establishing a powerful family.
In 1845, Norfolk was incorporated as a city. On June 7, 1855, the 183-foot vessel Benjamin Franklin put into Hampton Roads for repairs. The ship had just sailed from the West Indies, where there had been an outbreak of yellow fever. The port health officer ordered the ship quarantined. After eleven days, a second inspection found no issues, so it was allowed to dock. A few days later, the first cases of yellow fever were discovered in Norfolk, and a machinist died from the disease on July 8. By August, several people were dying per day, and a third of the city's population had fled in the hopes of escaping the epidemic. No one understood how the disease was transmitted. With both Norfolk and Portsmouth being infected, New York banned all traffic from those sites. Neighboring cities also banned residents from Norfolk. The epidemic spread through the city via mosquitoes and poor sanitation, affecting every family and causing widespread panic. The number of infected reached 5,000 in September, and by the second week, 1,500 had died in Norfolk and Portsmouth. As the weather cooled, the outbreak began to wane, leaving a final tally of about 3,200 dead. It took the city some time to recover.
On April 4, 1861, Norfolk city delegate to the Virginia Secession Convention, George Blow, voted against secession. Following the Battle of Fort Sumter, another vote occurred on April 17, where Blow voted for secession, the vote passed and Virginia seceded from the Union. In the spring of 1862, the Battle of Hampton Roads took place off the northwest shore of the city's Sewell's Point Peninsula, marking the first fight between two ironclads, the USS Monitor and the CSS Virginia. The battle ended in a stalemate but changed the course of naval warfare; from then on, warships were fortified with metal.
In May 1862, Norfolk Mayor William Lamb surrendered the city to Union General John E. Wool and his forces. They held the city under martial law for the duration of the Civil War. Thousands of slaves from the region escaped to Union lines to gain freedom; they quickly set up schools in Norfolk to start learning how to read and write, years before the end of the war.
1907 brought both the Virginian Railway and the Jamestown Exposition to Sewell's Point. The large Naval Review at the Exposition demonstrated the peninsula's favorable location and laid the groundwork for the world's largest naval base. Southern Democrats in Congress gained its location here. Commemorating the tricentennial anniversary of the founding of Jamestown, the exposition featured many prominent officials, including President Theodore Roosevelt, members of Congress, and diplomats from twenty-one countries. By 1917, as the US prepared to enter World War I, the Naval Air Station Hampton Roads had been constructed on the former exposition grounds. This facility was established as an air training station and a patrol base to conduct experimental work in seaplane operations at the Naval Operation Base.
In the first half of the twentieth century, the city of Norfolk expanded its borders through annexation. In 1906, the city annexed the incorporated town of Berkley, making the city cross the Elizabeth River. In 1923, the city expanded to include Sewell's Point, Willoughby Spit, the town of Campostella, and the Ocean View area. The city included the Navy Base and miles of beach property fronting on Hampton Roads and the Chesapeake Bay. After additional annexations in 1955 and 1959, and a 1988 land swap with Virginia Beach, the city assumed its current boundaries.
The establishment of the Interstate Highway System following World War II brought new highways to the region. A series of bridges and tunnels, constructed during fifteen years, linked Norfolk with the Peninsula, Portsmouth, and Virginia Beach. In 1952, the Downtown Tunnel opened to connect Norfolk with the city of Portsmouth. The highways also stimulated the development of new housing suburbs, leading to the population spreading out. Additional bridges and tunnels included the Hampton Roads Bridge-Tunnel in 1957, the Midtown Tunnel in 1962, and the Virginia Beach-Norfolk Expressway (Interstate 264 and State Route 44) in 1967. In 1991, the new Downtown Tunnel/Berkley Bridge complex opened a new system of multiple lanes of highway and interchanges connecting Downtown Norfolk and Interstate 464 with the Downtown Tunnel tubes.
In 1954, the Supreme Court ruled in Brown v. Board of Education that segregated public schools were unconstitutional, as the public system was supported by all taxpayers. It ordered integration, but Virginia pursued a policy of "massive resistance". (At this time, most black citizens were still disfranchised under the state's turn-of-the-century constitution and discriminatory practices related to voter registration and elections.) The Virginia General Assembly prohibited state funding for integrated public schools.
In 1958, United States district courts in Virginia ordered schools to open for the first time on a racially integrated basis. In response, Governor J. Lindsay Almond ordered the schools closed. The Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals declared the state law to be in conflict with the state constitution and ordered all public schools to be funded, whether integrated or not. About ten days later, Almond capitulated and asked the General Assembly to rescind several "massive resistance" laws. In February 1959, seventeen black children entered six previously segregated Norfolk public schools. Virginian-Pilot editor Lenoir Chambers editorialized against massive resistance and earned the Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Writing.
With new suburban developments beckoning, many white middle-class residents moved out of the city along new highway routes, and Norfolk's population declined, a pattern repeated in numerous cities during the postwar era independently of segregation issues. In the late-1960s and early-1970s, the advent of newer suburban shopping destinations along with freeways spelled demise for the fortunes of downtown's Granby Street commercial corridor, located just a few blocks inland from the waterfront. The opening of malls and large shopping centers drew off retail business from Granby Street.
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has been based in Norfolk since 1996.
Norfolk's city leaders began a long push to revive its urban core. While Granby Street underwent decline, Norfolk city leaders focused on the waterfront and its collection of decaying piers and warehouses. Many obsolete shipping and warehousing facilities were demolished. In their place, planners created a new boulevard, Waterside Drive, along which many of the high-rise buildings in Norfolk's skyline have been erected. In 1983, the city, The Rouse Company and the Enterprise Development Company developed the Waterside festival marketplace to attract people back to the waterfront and catalyze further downtown redevelopment. Waterside was redeveloped in 2017. Additionally, the waterfront area hosts the Nauticus maritime museum and science center, Hampton Roads Naval Museum, Half-Moone Cruise and Celebration Center, and the USS Wisconsin. Other facilities opened in the ensuing years, including the Harbor Park baseball stadium, home of the Norfolk Tides Triple-A minor league baseball team. In 1995, the park was named the finest facility in minor league baseball by Baseball America. Norfolk's efforts to revitalize its downtown have attracted acclaim from economic development and urban planning circles throughout the country. Downtown's rising fortunes helped to expand the city's revenues and allowed the city to direct attention to other neighborhoods.
Text from the Wikipedia article “Norfolk, Virginia”, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.