Richmond is a river city built on undulating hills at the rocky fall line separating the piedmont and tidewater regions of Virginia. The Falls of the James provided a natural site for settlement and commerce, and laid the foundation for the economic development of the city.
For centuries, the native peoples of the powerful Powhatan tribe recognized the value of this location, rich in natural beauty. They knew it as a place to hunt, fish, play, and trade, and they called it "Shocco," or Shockoe.
In 1607 came explorers, dispatched by the Virginia Company of London, seeking exotic minerals and a route to the unknown West. They found instead a fragrant weed grown by the natives, and tobacco became a lucrative commodity.
The trading post developed into a village, and in 1733 a town was laid out by William Byrd II and William Mayo. Its early buildings were clustered around the Farmers' Market, existing today at 17th Street.
Commerce burgeoned, although more than just agriculture exchanged hands: slaves, imported to Richmond's Manchester docks from Africa, were bought and sold at the same market.
Because of its strategic location, Richmond represents the evolution of transportation, literally from the ground up. To ease the transfer of cargo from the flat-bottomed bateaux above the Fall line to the ocean-faring ships below, George Washington helped design the Kanawha Canal in the 1700's to bypass Richmond's rapids. Rail superseded the canal in the 1800's, and the railroads were laid on the original canal towpaths. In the 1900's highways were constructed in the air over the same area.
Throughout these three centuries and three modes of transportation, downtown has always been a hub, with the Great Turning Basin for boats, the world's only triple crossing of rail lines, and the intersection of two major interstates.
Richmond's position as a center of government gives it economic stability today, but it was not always thus. A year after Governor Thomas Jefferson relocated the state capital from Williamsburg in 1780; the traitorous Benedict Arnold sacked and burned the fledgling city. And four years after the Confederacy established Richmond as its capital in 1861, the city was again consumed in a conflagration set by its own citizens retreating from Union troops.
Richmond emerged from the smoldering rubble of the Civil War as an economic powerhouse, with iron front buildings and massive brick factories. Innovation of this era included the world's first cigarette-rolling machine and the world's first successful electric street car system.
Freed slaves and their descendents created a thriving African-American business community, spearheaded by the likes of Maggie Walker and John Mitchell Jr. The city's historic Jackson Ward became known as the "Wall Street of Black America."
Law and finance have long been driving forces in the economy. Richmond is one of the only cities to seat both a U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and a Federal Reserve district, and downtown office buildings today house major law firms, banks, and brokerages.
Based on this strong foundation, Richmond's economy is embracing new frontiers. A Richmonder today is just as likely to be working in pharmaceuticals, insurance, advertising, biotechnology, education, tourism health services, or semi-conductors.
