Philadelphia

City of Philadelphia
Flag Seal
Nickname: "City of Brotherly Love","The City that Loves you Back," "Cradle of Liberty," "The Quaker City," "The Birthplace of America","The City of Neighborhoods," "Philly"
Motto: "Philadelphia maneto" ("Let brotherly love endure")
Coordinates: {{#invoke:Coordinates|coord}}{{#coordinates:39|57|12|N|75|10|12|W|type:city
	name= }}
Country	United States
Commonwealth	Pennsylvania
County	Philadelphia
Founded	October 27, 1682
Incorporated	October 25, 1701
Government
- Mayor	Michael Nutter (D)
Area
- City	135 sq mi (349.6 km²)
- Land	127.4 sq mi (326.144 km²)
- Water	7.6 sq mi (19.6 km²)
- Urban	1,799.5 sq mi (4,660.7 km²)
- Metro	4,629 sq mi (11,989 km²)
Elevation	39 ft (12 m)
Population (July 1st, 2007)
- City	1,449,634 (6th)
- Density	10,882.8/sq mi (4,201.8/km²)
- Urban	5,325,000
- Metro	5,823,233
Time zone	EST (UTC-5)
- Summer (DST)	EDT (UTC-4)
Area code(s)	215, 267
Website: http://www.phila.gov

Philadelphia is the largest city in Pennsylvania and the sixth-most-populous city in the United States. It is the fifth-largest metropolitan area and fourth-largest urban area by population in the United States, the nation's fourth-largest consumer media market as ranked by the Nielsen Media Research, and the 49th most-populous city in the world. It is 9th richest city in the world based on GDP figures. It is the county seat of Philadelphia County (with which it is coterminous). A popular nickname for Philadelphia is The City of Brotherly Love. It is commonly and informally referred to as Philly.

In 2005, the population of the city proper was estimated to be over 1.4 million, while the Greater Philadelphia metropolitan area, with a population of 5.8 million, was the fifth-largest in the United States. A commercial, educational, and cultural center, the city was once the second-largest in the British Empire (after London), and the social and geographical center of the original 13 American colonies. During the 18th century, it eclipsed New York City in political and social importance, with Benjamin Franklin taking a large role in Philadelphia's early rise to prominence. It was in this city that some of the ideas, and subsequent actions, gave birth to the American Revolution and American Independence, making Philadelphia a centerpiece of early American history. It was the most populous city of the young United States and served as the the nation's first capital.

Geography and cityscape

Topography

A simulated-color satellite image of Philadelphia taken on NASA's Landsat 7 satellite. The Delaware River is visible in this shot.

According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 142.6 square miles (369.3 km²). Bodies of water include the Delaware and Schuylkill Rivers, and Cobbs, Wissahickon, and Pennypack Creeks. The lowest point is sea level, while the highest point is in Chestnut Hill, at approximately 445 feet (136 m) above sea level. Philadelphia is located on the fall line separating the Atlantic Coastal Plain from the Piedmont.

Climate

Philadelphia falls in the northern periphery of the humid subtropical climate zone. Summers are typically hot and muggy, fall and spring are generally mild, and winter is cold. Snowfall is variable, with some winters bringing moderate snow and others bringing some snowstorms. Annual snowfall averages 21 inches (534 mm). Precipitation is generally spread throughout the year, with eight to eleven wet days per month, at an average annual rate of 42 inches (1068 mm).

Neighborhoods

File:Philly Street.jpg

A street in the Washington Square West neighborhood.

Philadelphia has many neighborhoods, each with its own identity. The large Philadelphia sections, North, Northeast, Northwest, West, South and Southwest Philadelphia surround Center City, which falls within the original city limits prior to consolidation in 1854. Numerous smaller neighborhoods within the areas coincide with the boroughs, townships, and other communities that made up Philadelphia County before their absorption by the city. Other neighborhoods formed based on ethnicity, religion, culture, and commercial reasons.

File:Downtownphilly.jpg

Center City Philadelphia from City Hall showing the Comcast Center and other buildings

Architecture

Row houses in West Philadelphia.

Philadelphia's architectural history dates back to Colonial times and includes a wide range of styles. The earliest structures were constructed with logs, but brick structures were common by 1700. During the 18th century, the cityscape was dominated by Georgian architecture, including Independence Hall. In the first decades of the 19th century, Federal architecture and Greek Revival architecture were popular. In the second half of the 19th century, Victorian architecture was common. Numerous glass and granite skyscrapers were built from the late 1980s onwards. In 2007, the Comcast Center became the city's tallest building.

For much of Philadelphia's history, the typical home has been the row house. For a time, row houses built elsewhere in the United States were known as "Philadelphia rows". There is a variety of row houses throughout the city from Victorian-style homes in North Philadelphia to twin row houses in West Philadelphia. While newer homes are scattered throughout the city, much of Philadelphia's housing is from the early 20th century or older. The age of the city's homes has created numerous problems, which has led to blight and vacant lots in many parts of the city, while other neighborhoods such as Society Hill, which has the largest concentration of 18th-century architecture in the United States, have been rehabilitated and gentrified.

History

Prior to the arrival of Europeans, the Philadelphia area was the location of the Lenape (Delaware) Indian village Shackamaxon. Europeans arrived in the Delaware Valley in the early 1600s, with the first settlements founded by the Dutch, British, and Swedish.

The Swedes sought to expand their influence by creating an agricultural (tobacco) and fur-trading colony to bypass French and British merchants. The New Sweden Company was chartered and included Swedish, Dutch and German stockholders. The first Swedish expedition to North America embarked from the port of Gothenburg in late 1637. It was organized and overseen by Clas Fleming, a Swedish admiral from Finland. Part of this colony, called New Sweden or Nya Sverige eventually included land on the west side of the Delaware River from just below the Schuylkill River: in other words, today's Philadelphia, southeast Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Maryland.

In 1644, New Sweden supported the Susquehannocks in their victory in a war against the English province of Maryland. A series of events led the Dutch —led by governor Peter Stuyvesant —to move an army to the Delaware River in the late summer of 1655. Though New Netherland now nominally controlled the colony, the Swedish and Finnish settlers continued to enjoy a degree of local autonomy, having their own militia, religion, court, and lands. This status lasted officially until the English conquest of the New Netherland colony, in October 1663-1664, and continued unofficially until the area was included in William Penn's charter for Pennsylvania, in 1682.

In 1681, as part of a repayment of a debt, Charles II of England granted William Penn a charter for what would become the Pennsylvania colony. Part of Penn's plan for the colony was to create a city on the Delaware River to serve as a port and place for government. Despite already having been given the land by Charles II, Penn bought the land from the local Lenape to be on good terms with the Native Americans and ensure peace for his colony. According to legend Penn made a treaty of friendship with Lenape chief Tammany under an elm tree at Shackamaxon, in what is now the city's Kensington section. As a Quaker, Penn had experienced religious persecution and wanted his colony to be a place where anyone could worship freely despite their religion. Penn named the city Philadelphia, which is Greek for brotherly love (philos, "love" or "friendship," and adelphos, "brother").

File:Westpenntreaty.jpg

"Penn's Treaty with the Indians" by Benjamin West.

William Penn's plan was that Philadelphia would be like an English rural town instead of a city. The city's roads were designed with a grid plan with the idea that houses and businesses would be spread far apart and surrounded by gardens and orchards. The city's inhabitants didn't follow Penn's plans and crowded by the Delaware River and subdivided and resold their lots. Before Penn left Philadelphia for the last time, he issued the Charter of 1701 establishing Philadelphia as a city. The city soon grew and established itself as an important trading center. Conditions in the city were poor at first, but by the 1750s living conditions had improved. A significant contributor to Philadelphia at the time was Benjamin Franklin. Franklin helped improve city services and founded new ones, such as the American Colonies' first hospital. Due to Philadelphia's central location in the colonies, during the American Revolution the city was used as the location for the First Continental Congress before the war, the Second Continental Congress, which signed the United States Declaration of Independence, during the war, and the Constitutional Convention after the war. A number of battles during the war were fought in Philadelphia and its environs as well. Unsuccessful lobbying after the war to make Philadelphia the United States capital helped make the city the temporary U.S. capital in the 1790s.

Benjamin Franklin

The state government left Philadelphia in 1799 and the federal government left soon after in 1800. However Philadelphia was still the largest city in the United States and a financial and cultural center. New York City soon surpassed Philadelphia in population, but construction of roads, canals, and railroads helped turn Philadelphia into the United States' first major industrial city. Throughout the 19th century Philadelphia had a large variety of industries and businesses, the largest being textiles. Major corporations in the 19th and early 20th centuries included the Baldwin Locomotive Works, William Cramp and Sons Ship and Engine Building Company, and the Pennsylvania Railroad. Industry, along with the U.S. Centennial, was celebrated in 1876 with the Centennial Exposition, the first official World's Fair in the United States. Immigrants, mostly German and Irish, settled in Philadelphia and the surrounding districts. The rise in population of the surrounding districts helped lead to the Act of Consolidation of 1854 which extended the city of Philadelphia to include all of Philadelphia County. In the later half of the century immigrants from Russia, Eastern Europe, and Italy and African Americans from the southern U.S. settled in the city.

8th and Market Street, showing the Strawbridge and Clothier department store, 1910s.

By the 20th century Philadelphia had become known as "corrupt and contented." Philadelphians were content with the city's lack of change or excitement, and single-party politics, centered on the city's entrenched Republican political machine, allowed corruption to flourish. The machine and corruption permeated in all parts of city government and reformers had little success. The first major success in reform came in 1917 when outrage over the murder of a police officer during that year's election led to the shrinking of the Philadelphia City Council from two houses to just one. In the 1920s the public flouting of Prohibition laws, mob violence, and police involvement in illegal activities led to the appointment of Brigadier General Smedley Butler of the U.S. Marine Corps as director of public safety, but political pressure prevented any long term success in fighting crime and corruption.

After struggling through the Great Depression, World War II created jobs and brought the city out of the Depression. However, after the war there was a severe housing shortage with about half the city's housing being built in the 19th century, many of which lacked proper facilities. Adding to housing problem was white flight, as African Americans and Puerto Ricans moved into new neighborhoods resulting in racial tension. After a population peak of over two million residents in 1950 the city's population declined while the suburban neighboring counties grew. After a five year investigation into corruption into city government, the outcry with what the investigation found led the drafting of a new city charter in 1950. The city charter strengthened the position of the mayor and weakened the city council among other changes to help prevent the corruption of the past. The first Democratic mayor since the first half of the 19th century was elected in 1951. However, after two early reform mayors, a Democratic political organization had established itself replacing the old Republican one.

Protests, riots and racial tensions were common in the 1960s and 70s. Mostly drug related gang violence plagued the city. In the mid 1980s, crack houses invaded the city's slums. Confrontations between police and the radical group MOVE culminated when the police dropped a satchel bomb on their headquarters starting a fire that killed eleven MOVE members and destroyed sixty-two neighboring houses. Revitalization and gentrification of neighborhoods began in the 1960s and continues into the 21st century, with much of the development in the Center City and University City areas of the city. After many of the old manufacturers and businesses had left Philadelphia or shut down, the city started attracting service businesses and began to more aggressively market itself as a tourist destination. Glass and granite skyscrapers were built in Center City. Historic areas such as Independence National Historical Park located in Society Hill were resuscitated during the reformist mayoral era of the 1950s through the 1980s and are now among the most desirable living areas of Center City. This has slowed the city's forty-year population decline after losing nearly a quarter of its population.

Government and politics

City Hall decorated.

The city is the seat of its own county. All county functions were assumed by the city in 1952, which has been coterminous with the county since 1854.

The city uses the "strong-mayor" version of the mayor-council form of government, which is headed by one mayor, in whom executive authority is vested. The mayor is limited to two consecutive four-year terms under the city's home rule charter, but can run for the position again after an intervening term. The current mayor, having taken office in January 2008, is Michael Nutter. Nutter, as all Philadelphia mayors have been since 1952, is a member of the Democratic Party, which tends to dominate local politics so thoroughly that the Democratic primary for mayor is often more noticeable than the general mayoral election. The legislative branch, the Philadelphia City Council, consists of ten council members representing individual districts and seven members elected at large.

Politics

Presidential election results

Year	Republican	Democratic
2004	19.3% 130,099	80.4% 542,205
2000	18.0% 100,959	80.0% 449,182
1996	16.0% 85,345	77.5% 412,988
1992	20.9% 133,328	68.2% 434,904
1988	32.5% 219,053	66.6% 449,566
1984	34.6% 267,178	64.9% 501,369
1980	34.0% 244,108	58.7% 421,253
1976	32.0% 239,000	66.3% 494,579
1972	43.4% 340,096	55.1% 431,736
1968	30.0% 254,153	61.8% 525,768
1964	26.2% 239,733	73.4% 670,645
1960	31.8% 291,000	68.0% 622,544

From the American Civil War until the mid-20th century, Philadelphia was a bastion of the Republican Party, which arose from the staunch pro-Northern views of Philadelphia residents during and after the war. After the Great Depression, Democratic registrations increased, but the city was not carried by Democratic Franklin D. Roosevelt in his landslide victory of 1932 (in which Pennsylvania was one of the few states won by Republican Herbert Hoover). While other Northern industrial cities were electing Democratic mayors in the 1930s and 1940s, Philadelphia did not follow suit until 1951.

The city is now one of the most Democratic in the country, despite the frequent election of Republicans to statewide offices since the 1930s.

Philadelphia once comprised six congressional districts. As a result of the city's declining population, it now has only four. Although they are usually swamped by Democrats in city, state and national elections, Republicans still have some support in the area; a Republican represented a significant portion of Philadelphia in the House as late as 1983. Pennsylvania's Republican senator, Arlen Specter, is from Philadelphia.

Crime

Like many American cities, Philadelphia saw a gradual yet pronounced rise in crime in the years following World War II. Murders peaked in 1990 at 525. There were an average of about 400 murders a year for most of the 1990s. The murder count dropped in 2002 to 288, then surged four years later to 406. Out of the ten most populous cities in the United States in 2006, Philadelphia had the highest homicide rate at 28 per 100,000 people, though the number of murders decreased to 369 in 2007.

In 2004, there were 5,513.5 crimes per 100,000 people in Philadelphia. In 2005, Philadelphia was ranked as the sixth most dangerous among 32 American cities with populations over 500,000.

In 2006, Camden was the fifth-most dangerous city in the country, lower than its 2004 ranking, but still high for a city its size, while Philadelphia was ranked 29th.

On September 12, 2007, police commissioner Sylvester Johnson called on 10,000 African American men to patrol the streets to lessen crime. Johnson, set up "Call to Action: 10,000 Men, It's a New Day" in response to the city's disproportionate homicide rate of young African Americans. Dennis Muhammad, Nation of Islam official, and Mayor John F. Street supported the project. The program was to begin on October 21.

Economy

Comcast Center, Philadelphia's newest office building.

Philadelphia's economy is relatively diversified, with meaningful portions of its total output derived from manufacturing, oil refining, food processing, health care and biotechnology, tourism and financial services. According to a study prepared by PricewaterhouseCoopers, Philadelphia and its surrounding region had the fourth highest GDP among American cities, with a total GDP of $312 billion in 2005. Only New York City ($1,133 billion), Los Angeles ($693 billion), and Chicago ($460 billion) had higher total economic output levels among American cities. Philadelphia ranked below Tokyo ($1,191 billion), Paris ($460 billion), London ($452 billion), Osaka-Kobe ($391 billion), Mexico City ($315 billion), and above Washington, D.C. ($299 billion).

The city is home to the Philadelphia Stock Exchange and several Fortune 500 companies, including cable television and Internet provider Comcast, insurance companies CIGNA and Lincoln Financial Group, energy company Sunoco, food services company Aramark, Crown Holdings Incorporated, chemical makers Rohm and Haas Company and FMC Corporation, pharmaceutical companies Wyeth and GlaxoSmithKline, Boeing helicopters division, and automotive parts retailer Pep Boys. Early in the 20th Century, it was also home to the pioneering brass era automobile company Biddle.

The federal government has several facilities in Philadelphia as well. The East Coast operations of the United States Mint are based near the historic district, and the Federal Reserve Bank's Philadelphia division is based there as well.

Baltimore Avenue towards Center City.

Medicine

Philadelphia is also an important center for medicine, a distinction that it has held since the colonial period. The city is home to the first hospital in the British North American colonies, Pennsylvania Hospital, and the first medical school in what is now the United States, at the University of Pennsylvania. The university, the city's largest private employer, also runs a large teaching hospital and extensive medical system. There are also major hospitals affiliated with Temple University School of Medicine, Drexel University College of Medicine, Thomas Jefferson University, and Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine. Philadelphia also has three distinguished children's hospitals: Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, the nation's first pediatric hospital (located adjacent to the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania), St. Christopher's Hospital, and the Shriners' Hospital. Together, health care is the largest sector of employment in the city.

In part because of Philadelphia's long-running importance as a center for medical research, the region is a major center for the pharmaceutical industry. GlaxoSmithKline, AstraZeneca, Wyeth, Merck, GE Healthcare, Johnson and Johnson and Siemens Medical Solutions are just some of the large pharmaceutical companies with operations in the region. The city is also home to the nation's first school of pharmacy, the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy, now called the University of the Sciences in Philadelphia.

Italian Market, South Philadelphia

Media

Philadelphia's two major newspapers are the Philadelphia Inquirer and the Philadelphia Daily News, both of which are owned by Philadelphia Media Holdings LLC. The Inquirer, founded in 1829, is the third-oldest surviving daily newspaper in the United States.

The Inquirer Building on North Broad Street.

The first experimental radio license was issued in Philadelphia in August 1912 to St. Joseph's College. The first commercial radio stations appeared in 1922.

During the 1930s, the experimental station W3XE, which was owned by Philco Corp, became the first television station in Philadelphia. The station became NBC's first affiliate in 1939.

Infrastructure

30th Street Station, with Cira Centre in the background and statues on the Market Street Bridge over Schuylkill River in the foreground

Philadelphia is served by the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA), which operates buses, trains, rapid transit, trolleys, and trackless trolleys throughout Philadelphia, the four Pennsylvania suburban counties of Bucks, Chester, Delaware, and Montgomery, in addition to service to Mercer County, New Jersey and New Castle County, Delaware. The city's subway, opened in 1907, is the third-oldest in America.

Philadelphia's 30th Street Station is a major railroad station on Amtrak's Northeast Corridor, which offers access to Amtrak, SEPTA, and New Jersey Transit lines.

Airports

Two airports serve Philadelphia: the Philadelphia International Airport (PHL), straddling the southern boundary of the city, and the Northeast Philadelphia Airport (PNE), a general aviation reliever airport in Northeast Philadelphia. As of March 2006, Philadelphia International Airport was the 10th largest airport measured by "traffic movements" (i.e., takeoffs and landings), and was also a primary hub for US Airways.

Buses

Philadelphia is also a major hub for Greyhound Lines, which operates 24-hour service to points east of the Mississippi River. In 2006, the Philadelphia Greyhound Terminal was the second busiest Greyhound terminal in the United States, after the Port Authority Bus Terminal in New York.

Suburban Station

File:PhiladelphiaSubwayStationMarketFrankford.jpg

Market-Frankford Line entrance in Old City

Rail

Since the early days of rail transport in the United States, Philadelphia has served as hub for several major rail companies, particularly the Pennsylvania Railroad and the Reading Railroad.

Philadelphia, once home to more than 4,000 trolleys on 65 lines, is one of the few North American cities to maintain streetcar lines. Today, SEPTA operates five "subway-surface" trolleys that run on street-level tracks in West Philadelphia and subway tunnels in Center City.

Philadelphia skyline as seen from the South Street Bridge

Demographics

As of the census of 2000, there were 1,517,550 people, 590,071 households, and 352,272 families residing in the city. The population density was 11,233.6/square mile (4,337.3/km²). There were 661,958 housing units at an average density of 4,900.1/sq mi (1,891.9/km²). As of the 2004 Census estimations, there were 1,463,281 people, 658,799 housing units, and the racial makeup of the city was 43.2% African American, 45.0% white, 5.5% Asian, 0.3% Native American, 0.1% Pacific Islander, 5.8% from other races, and 2.2% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 8.5% of the population. The top 5 largest ancestries include Irish (13.6%), Italian (9.2%), German (8.1%), Polish (4.3%), and English (2.9%).

Of the 590,071 households, 27.6% have children under the age of 18 living with them, 32.1% were married couples living together, 22.3% had a female householder with no husband present, and 40.3% were non-families. 33.8% of all households were made up of individuals and 11.9% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.48 and the average family size was 3.22.

In the city the population was spread out with 25.3% under the age of 18, 11.1% from 18 to 24, 29.3% from 25 to 44, 20.3% from 45 to 64, and 14.1% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 34 years. For every 100 females there were 86.8 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 81.8 males.

The median income for a household in the city was $30,746, and the median income for a family was $37,036. Males had a median income of $34,199 versus $28,477 for females. The per capita income for the city was $16,509. About 18.4% of families and 22.9% of the population were below the poverty line, including 31.3% of those under age 18 and 16.9% of those age 65 or over.

As of 2008 more than 500,000 immigrants call the Philadelphia metropolitan area home. More than one-fifth of these immigrants have arrived since 2000, resulting in an increase of 113,000 immigrants between the years 2000 and 2006. This is nearly the same amount of immigrants that arrived during the decade of the 1990s, who today comprise 9% of the city's population. As reported by the Brookings Institution, the Philadelphia area is poised to re-emerge as a destination for immigrants, a longtime characteristic of the region that stalled in the mid-20th century.

Philadelphia has the second largest Irish, Italian, and Jamaican populations and the fourth largest African American population in the nation. Philadelphia also has the fourth largest population of Polish residents. In recent years, the Hispanic and Asian American populations have significantly increased. Hispanics have settled throughout the city, especially around El Centro de Oro. Philadelphia is home to the third largest Puerto Rican population in the United States. In recent years many Mexican immigrants have come to areas around the Italian Market. There are an estimated 10,000 Mexicans living in South Philadelphia. Mexicans and Guatemalans also have settled in small communities in North Philadelphia. Colombian immigrants have also come to the Olney neighborhood. The Asian population was once concentrated in the city's thriving Chinatown, but now Korean Americans have come to Olney, and Vietnamese have forged bazaars next to the Italian Market in South Philadelphia. Concentrations of Cambodian American neighborhoods can be found in North and South Philadelphia. Indians and Arabs have come to Northeast Philadelphia along with Russian and Ukrainian immigrants. This large influx of Asians has given Philadelphia one of the largest populations of Vietnamese, Cambodians, Chinese, and Koreans in United States. The Philadelphia region also has the fourth largest population of Indian Americans. The West Indian population is concentrated in Cedar Park. Germans, Greeks, Chinese, Japanese, English, Pakistanis, Iranians, and also immigrants from the former Yugoslavia along with other ethnic groups can be found throughout the city.

At the 2007 U.S. Census estimates, the city's population was 43.9% White (39.4% non-Hispanic-White alone), 44.9% Black or African American (43.0% non-Hispanic Black or African American alone), 0.7% American Indian and Alaska Native, 5.7% Asian, 0.1% Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander, 6.7% from other races and 1.6% from two or more races. 10.3% of the total population were Hispanic or Latino of any race (most of them Puerto Ricans).

Education

University of Pennsylvania

File:BarbelinWalkway.jpg

Walkway at Saint Joseph's University

Elementary and secondary

Education in Philadelphia is provided by many private and public institutions. The School District of Philadelphia runs the city's public schools. The Philadelphia School District is the eighth largest school district in the United States with 210,432 students in 346 public and charter schools.

Colleges and universities

Philadelphia is one of the largest college towns in the United States and has the second-largest student concentration on the East Coast with over 120,000 college and university students enrolled within the city and nearly 300,000 in the metropolitan area. There are over 80 colleges, universities, trade, and specialty schools in the Philadelphia region. The city contains three major research universities: the University of Pennsylvania, Drexel University, and Temple University.

Culture

Independence Hall in Philadelphia

Philadelphia contains many national historical sites that relate to the founding of the United States. Independence National Historical Park is the center of these historical landmarks. Independence Hall, where the Declaration of Independence was signed, and the Liberty Bell are the city's most famous attractions. Other historic sites include homes for Edgar Allan Poe, Betsy Ross, and Thaddeus Kosciuszko, early government buildings like the First and Second Banks of the United States, Fort Mifflin, and the Gloria Dei (Old Swedes') Church National Historic Site.

Philadelphia's major science museums include the Franklin Institute, which contains the Benjamin Franklin National Memorial, the Academy of Natural Sciences, and the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. History museums include the National Constitution Center, the Atwater Kent Museum of Philadelphia History, the National Museum of American Jewish History, the African American Museum in Philadelphia, and the Historical Society of Pennsylvania. Philadelphia is home to the United States' first zoo and hospital.

Arts

Two statues, The Amazon and Rocky, outside the Philadelphia Museum of Art.

The city contains many art museums such as the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and the Rodin Museum, the largest collection of work by Auguste Rodin outside of France. The city’s major art museum, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, is one of the largest art museums in the United States.

The city is home to the Philadelphia Sketch Club, one of the country's oldest artists' clubs; and to a profusion of art galleries, many of which participate in the First Friday event. The first Friday of every month galleries in Old City are open late. Annual events include film festivals and parades, the most famous being the New Year's Day Mummers Parade.

Areas such as South Street and Old City have a vibrant night life. The Avenue of the Arts in Center City contains many restaurants and theaters, such as the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts, which is home to the Philadelphia Orchestra, and the Academy of Music, the nation's oldest continually operating venue, home to the Opera Company of Philadelphia.

Philadelphia sculptor James Peniston's Keys To Community in the Old City neighborhood, one of the city's many public artworks featuring images of Benjamin Franklin

Philadelphia has more public art than any other American city. In 1872, the Fairmount Park Art Association was created, the first private association in the United States dedicated to integrating public art and urban planning. In 1959, lobbying by the Artists Equity Association helped create the Percent for Art ordinance, the first for a U.S. city. The program, which has funded more than 200 pieces of public art, is administered by the Philadelphia Office of Arts and Culture, the city's art agency.

In particular, Philadelphia has more murals than any other U.S. city, thanks in part to the 1984 creation of the Department of Recreation's Mural Arts Program, which seeks to beautify neighborhoods and provide an outlet for graffiti artists. The program has funded more than 2,700 murals by professional, staff and volunteer artists.

Philadelphia has had a prominent role in music. In the 1970s, Philadelphia soul influenced the music of that and later eras. On July 13 1985, Philadelphia hosted the American end of the Live Aid concert at John F. Kennedy Stadium. The city reprised this role for the Live 8 concert, bringing some 700,000 people to the Ben Franklin Parkway on July 2 2005.

Sports

Philadelphia has a long history of professional sports teams, and is one of thirteen U.S. cities to have all four major sports: the Philadelphia Eagles of the National Football League, the Philadelphia Flyers of the National Hockey League, the Philadelphia Phillies in the National League of Major League Baseball, and the Philadelphia 76ers in the National Basketball Association.

Philadelphia is also known for the Philadelphia Big 5, a group of five Division I college basketball programs: Saint Joseph's University, University of Pennsylvania, La Salle University, Temple University, and Villanova University. The sixth NCAA Division I school in Philadelphia is Drexel University. At least one of the teams is competitive nearly every year and at least one team has made the NCAA tournament for the past four decades.

In February 2008, Philadelphia beat out competition to be awarded the 16th Major League Soccer franchise. They will enter the league in 2010 calling Chester Stadium their home (a soccer specific stadium) in Chester, PA.

External links

• Official Philadelphia government website
• Philadelphia history at Philly History
• Philadelphia Center for Architecture
• Philadelphia Architects and Buildings
• Philadelphia Convention & Visitors Bureau
• ushistory.org from the Independence Hall Association
• Philly.com, home page of The Philadelphia Inquirer and Philadelphia Daily News
• neighborhoodBase Statistical mapping system for Philadelphia run by the University of Pennsylvania
• Philadelphia Police Department
• Greater Philadelphia Tourism Marketing Corporation

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