St. Louis (French: Saint-Louis or St-Louis) is an independent city and a major United States port on the eastern line of the state of Missouri. As of the 2010 census, the population was 319, 294, and a 2012 estimate put the population at 318,172, making it the 58th-largest U.S. city in 2012. The metropolitan St. Louis area, known as Greater St. Louis (CSA), is the 19th-largest metropolitan area in the United States with a population of 2,900,605. The city of St. Louis was founded in 1764 by Pierre Laclède and Auguste Chouteau, and named for Louis IX of France. After the Louisiana Purchase, it became a major port on the Mississippi River; in the late 19th century, it became the fourth-largest city in the United States. It seceded from St. Louis County in March 1877, allowing it to become an independent city and limiting its political boundaries. In 1904, it hosted the Louisiana Purchase Exposition and the 1904 Summer Olympics. The city's population peaked in 1950, then began a long decline that continues in the 21st century. Immigration has increased, and it is the center of the largest Bosnian population in the world outside their homeland. The economy of St. Louis relies on service, manufacturing, trade, transportation of goods, and tourism. The city is home to several corporations, including Peabody Energy, Ameren, Ralcorp and Sigma-Aldrich. St. Louis is home to three professional sports teams: the St. Louis Cardinals, one of the most successful Major League Baseball clubs; the hockey St. Louis Blues, and the football St. Louis Rams. The city is commonly identified with the Gateway Arch, part of the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial in downtown St. Louis. The area that would become St. Louis was a center of Native American Mississippian culture, which built numerous temple and residential earthwork mounds on both sides of the Mississippi River. Their major center was at Cahokia Mounds, active from 900CE to 1500 CE. The major earthworks within St. Louis boundaries were the source of the city’s early nickname, the “Mound City.” Historic Native American tribes in the area included the Siouan-speaking Osage people and the Illiniwek. European exploration of the area was recorded in 1673, when French explorers Louis Jolliet and Jacques Marquette traveled through the Mississippi River valley. Five years later, La Salle claimed the region for France as part of La Louisiane. The earliest European settlements in the area were built in Illinois Country (also known as Upper Louisiana) during the 1690s and early 1700s at Cahokia, Kaskaskia, and Fort de Chartres. Migrants from the eastern French villages founded Ste. Genevieve, Missouri, across the Mississippi River from Kaskaskia. In early 1764, after France lost to the British in North America, Pierre Laclède and his stepson Auguste Chouteau founded the city of St. Louis. The early French families built the city’s economy on the fur trade with the Osage, as well as with more distant tribes along the Missouri River. They used African slaves as domestic servants and workers in the city. From 1764 to 1803 European control of the area west of the Mississippi to the northernmost part of the Missouri River basin, called Louisiana, was assumed by the Spanish as part of the Viceroyalty of New Spain. In 1780 during the American Revolutionary War, St. Louis was attacked by British forces, mostly Native American allies, in the Battle of St. Louis.
