The New International Encyclopædia/Evansville

EVANSVILLE. A city, port of entry, and county-seat of Vanderburg County, Ind., 180 miles southwest of Indianapolis; on the Ohio River, and on the Evansville and Terre Haute; the Louisville, Evansville and Saint Louis; the Louisville and Nashville, and other railroads (Map: Indiana, B 4). Coal abounds in the vicinity, and the city has a large trade in coal, timber, grain, pork, tobacco, and flour. The industrial plants include foundries and machine-shops, flouring-mills, furniture-factories, plow-works, and establishments for the manufacture of liquors, cotton and woolen goods, leather, etc. Among the more prominent buildings are the custom-house, court-house, city hall, United States Marine Hospital, State Hospital for the Insane, Evans (Temperance) Hall, and Willard Library. Other features of interest are Cooks, Mesker, and Garvin parks. The government is administered under a charter of 1893, which provides for a mayor, elected every four years, and a city council, the majority of the members of which are elected by wards, and the rest at large. All other officials, excepting the clerk of the city, who is chosen by the council, are appointed by the executive. The annual income of the city is about $940,000; annual expenditures, about $700,000. The principal items of expense are $50,000 for the police department, $55,000 for the fire department, and $170,000 for schools. The water-works are owned by the city, the yearly cost of operation being about $30,000. Evansville founded in 1816 by General Robert M. Evans, became the county-seat in 1819, and with a population of 4000 was incorporated as a city in 1847. Population in 1890, 50,750; in 1900, 59,007.