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Norfolk Information
The site of what is now Norfolk was originally the Chesipean Indian town Skicoak. (The Chesipeans had been destroyed by Powhatan by the time of the arrival of the first English settlers, who, in 1585, settled on Roanoke Island in modern-day North Carolina. In 1591, the colony of Roanoke disappeared without a trace.) The city was laid out in 1682 and incorporated in 1845. During the US Civil War, in 1862, the Battle of Hampton Roads between the ironclads Monitor and Merrimac was fought off Norfolk.
Norfolk is a major military center. With Portsmouth, it forms an extensive naval complex. The headquarters of the 5th Naval District, the Atlantic Fleet, the 2nd Fleet, and the Supreme Allied Command are there at Sewell's Point. Naval Station Norfolk is the largest naval base in the United States and includes a naval air station and other facilities. The Norfolk Naval Shipyard or "Norfolk Navy Yard" is in Portsmouth, Virginia. (They could not name it the "Portsmouth Naval Shipyard," because there was already one of those in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.) Several vessels of the Navy have been named USS Norfolk after the city.
General Douglas MacArthur is buried in the city; there is a small museum for him, and a major shopping mall across the street from his burial site is named for him. The city is home to Old Dominion University and Norfolk State University; Virginia Wesleyan College, a private liberal arts college, has a Norfolk mailing address, but almost all of its campus lies in the adjacent city of Virginia Beach. The city's public school system comprises 5 high schools, 8 middle schools, 34 elementary schools, and 9 special-purpose/preschools. Norfolk Academy, founded in 1728, is the city's oldest independent school.
The international headquarters of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals are located on the city's waterfront just to the west of downtown. |
