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Published: December 25th 2006
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Newport News
Newport News, Virginia - United States of America Sep 25, 2005
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City official name :Newport News
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Founded date : *
Location :Virginia State
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Elavation :? ft (? m)
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Area :Approximately ? square miles (? kmĀ²).
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Facts :Newport News is an independent city in Virginia. It is on the southeastern end of the Virginia Peninsula, on the north shore of the James River extending to its mouth at Hampton Roads. The name of Newport News has long been a puzzle to those curious about the origin of place names.
First settled in the early 17th century, it was earliest known as Newport News Point, and became an unincorporated town without formal boundaries in Warwick County for over 250 years, until 1896. In 1900, 19,635 people lived in Newport News, Virginia; in 1910, 20,205; in 1920, 35,596; and in 1940, 37,067. However, the city consolidated with the former Warwick County by mututal consent in 1958, becoming Virginia's third largest in city population. As of the 2000 census, the city population was 180,150. A more recent 2005 estimate indicates the city's population has grown to 195,347. In modern times, it is one of Virginia's larger cities.
Among the city's major industries are Newport News
Newport News
Newport News, Virginia - United States of America Shipbuilding and Drydock Company, which is now owned by Northrop Grumman which was previously owned by Tenneco, and the large coal piers supplied by railroad giant CSX Transportation. Miles of the waterfront can be seen by automobiles crossing the James River Bridge and Monitor-Merrimac Memorial Bridge-Tunnel. Recovered artifacts from the USS Monitor are displayed at the Mariners' Museum, and American Civil War battle sites near historic Lee Hall and several plantations have been protected along the roads leading to Yorktown and Williamsburg of the Historic Triangle.
The original downtown area was first referred to as "Newportes Newes" as early as 1619 and is purported to be the longest continuously named (by white people) place in the United States.
The source of the name "Newport News" is not known with certainty. Several versions are recorded, and it is subject of popular speculation locally. Probably the best-known explanation holds that when the first Jamestown, Virginia colonists left to return to England after the Starving Time of 1610, they encountered Captain Christopher Newport's ship in the James River off Mulberry Island, and learned that reinforcements of men and supplies had arrived, and that the colonists need not abandon Jamestown. (It is
Newport News
Newport News, Virginia - United States of America probable that not all of the survivors thought returning to the harsh conditions of Jamestown was "good" news, however). Under this theory, the community was named for Newport's "good news".
Less dramatically, the city may have derived its name from an old English word "news" meaning "new town." Yet another theory is that the original name was New Port Neuce, named for a person with the name Neuce and the town's place as a new seaport. The founder was Sir William Neuce. He was originally an English soldier and settler in Ireland where he had established Newcestown near Bandon in County Cork. After his death, his partner Daniel Gookin - another English colonist at Carrigaline in Ireland - completed the establishment of his colony in Virginia. At least one source reports that the "New" arose from the original settlement's being rebuilt after a fire.
That the name was formerly written as "Newport's News" is verified by numerous early documents and maps, and by local tradition. The change to Newport News apparently was brought about by usage, for by 1851 the Post Office Department sanctioned "New Port News" (three words as the name of the first post office, and
Newport News
Newport News, Virginia - United States of America in 1866 it approved the name as "Newport News", the current form.
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