Indianapolis

Indianapolis, the capital and largest city of Indiana, is on the west fork of White River, on a level plain, near the centre of the state, 195 miles SSE. of Chicago by rail. It is a regularly-built and beautiful city. Its streets, many of them 100 feet wide, for the most part cross at right angles; but four main avenues, radiating from a central park, cross the others diagonally. The principal buildings include a handsome new state-house (completed 1888), a fine county court-house, a city hall, a prison for women, a large state asylum for the insane, and other asylums for the blind and deaf and dumb; and the city possesses an imposing monument to the soldiers and sailors who fell in the civil war. It has also two medical colleges, numerous schools, and nearly a hundred churches. Indianapolis is one of the chief railway centres of the United States, fifteen main lines converging here. The trade in agricultural produce is very considerable. Pork-packing is the leading industry, but there are also large flour and cotton and woollen mills, numerous foundries, and manufactories of furniture, carriages, tiles, &c. (see INDIANA). The site of Indianapolis, then covered with dense forest, was selected for the future capital in 1820, and the city was founded in 1821. In 1860 the pop. was 18,113; (1870) 48,244; (1880) 75,056; (1890) 105,436.