Editing Roanoke, Virginia (section)

=== Early history and incorporation ===
The current site of Roanoke lies near the intersection of the [[Great Wagon Road]] and the [[Carolina Road]], two branches of a network of early colonial roads that developed from Native American trails in the [[Appalachia]]n region.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Rouse, Jr. |first=Parke |title=The Great Wagon Road: From Philadelphia to the South |publisher=McGraw-Hill Book Company |year=1973 |isbn=978-0-07-054101-6}}</ref> While the name ''Roanoke'' is said to have originated from a Native American word for shell beads used as [[shell money|currency]],<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Otto |first=Paul |date=2017 |title="This is that which...they call Wampum" Europeans Coming to Terms With Native Shell Beads |url=https://digitalcommons.georgefox.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1075&context=hist_fac |journal=Faculty Publications - Department of History, Politics, and International Studies |issue=77}}</ref> that word was first used {{convert|300|mi|km}} away, where the [[Roanoke River]] empties into the Atlantic Ocean near [[Roanoke Island]].<ref name="Kagey">{{Cite book |last=Kagey |first=Deedie |title=When Past is Prologue: A History of Roanoke County |publisher=Roanoke County Sesquicentennial Committee |year=1988 |page=7}}</ref> The [[Roanoke Valley]] itself was originally home to members of the [[Tutelo]] tribe,<ref name="Kagey" /><ref name="Griffin-1942">{{Cite journal |last=Griffin |first=James B. |date=1942 |title=On the Historic Location of the Tutelo and the Mohetan in the Ohio Valley |journal=American Anthropologist |language=en |volume=44 |issue=2 |pages=275–280 |doi=10.1525/aa.1942.44.2.02a00080 |issn=0002-7294 |doi-access=free}}</ref> a [[Siouan languages|Siouan]]-speaking people who were gradually pushed out of the area by advancing European settlers.<ref name="Griffin-1942" />

Many of those settlers were [[Scotch-Irish Americans|Scotch-Irish]] who arrived in the region during the 18th and early 19th centuries following the [[Plantation of Ulster]].<ref name="Barnes-1968">{{Cite book |last=Barnes |first=Raymond P. |title=A History of the City of Roanoke |publisher=Commonwealth Press, Inc. |year=1968 |pages=}}</ref>{{rp|3}} They were followed by significant numbers of Germans from [[Pennsylvania]] via the Great Wagon Road.{{r|Barnes-1968|p=3}}<ref name=Kagey /> By 1838, the area was populated enough that [[Roanoke County, Virginia|Roanoke County]] was created out of parts of [[Botetourt County, Virginia|Botetourt]] and [[Montgomery County, Virginia|Montgomery]] Counties,<ref>{{Cite web |title=History {{!}} Roanoke County, VA - Official Website |url=https://www.roanokecountyva.gov/805/History |access-date=May 24, 2023 |website=www.roanokecountyva.gov |archive-date=May 24, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230524190942/https://www.roanokecountyva.gov/805/History |url-status=live}}</ref> and the area's first railroad, the [[Virginia and Tennessee Railroad|Virginia and Tennessee]], arrived in 1852.<ref name="White-1982">{{Cite book |last=White |first=Clare |title=Roanoke 1740-1982 |publisher=Roanoke Valley Historical Society |year=1982 |pages=}}</ref>{{rp|49}}

The railroad built its new [[Train station|depot]] just south of a small town named Gainesborough, but named the depot after Big Lick, another small community located just to the east, which itself was named after the salt deposits that had drawn game to the area for years.{{r|White-1982|p=49}}{{r|Dotson|p=2}} Gainesborough increasingly became referred to as Big Lick (and later as Old Lick) once development drifted farther south towards the depot.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Hill Studio |date=February 2004 |title=Historic Architectural Survey of and National Register Nominations for Roanoke Downtown Historic District |url=https://www.dhr.virginia.gov/pdf_files/SpecialCollections/RN-086_Histoirc_AH_Survey_RoanokeDowntownHD_2004_HILL_report.pdf |access-date=May 24, 2023 |archive-date=May 31, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230531171008/https://www.dhr.virginia.gov/pdf_files/SpecialCollections/RN-086_Histoirc_AH_Survey_RoanokeDowntownHD_2004_HILL_report.pdf |url-status=live}}</ref> Growth in the area was stalled by the [[American Civil War|Civil War]]; Roanoke County voted 850–0 in favor of [[secession]] and lost many of its men in the subsequent fighting.{{r|White-1982|p=53}} The burgeoning [[Tobacco industry|tobacco trade]] helped the region's recovery during [[Reconstruction era|Reconstruction]]. Within a decade of the war's end, there were no fewer than six tobacco factories near the Big Lick Depot.{{r|White-1982|p=58}}

In 1874, the community surrounding the depot applied for and received a town charter, and the Town of Big Lick was formally established.{{r|Barnes-1968|p=71}} Eight years later, efforts by town boosters succeeded in securing Big Lick as the junction of the [[Shenandoah Valley Railroad (1867–1890)|Shenandoah Valley Railroad]] and the [[Norfolk and Western Railway]] (N&W).{{r|White-1982|p=65}} The two companies also relocated their respective headquarters to the town (the two lines would officially merge in 1890).{{r|White-1982|p=70}}{{r|Barnes-1968|p=204}} Big Lick's relatively small size compared to the nearby county seat, [[Salem, Virginia|Salem]], worked in its favor as a draw for the companies. Big Lick's ample farmland and nearby water sources were well suited to the railroads' goal of building much of the town from scratch, including railroad shops, offices, a hotel, and suitable housing for their many employees.{{r|Barnes-1968|p=86}}{{r|Dotson|p=8}}
[[File:Roanoke_Hotel_1910.jpg|left|thumb|251x251px|[[Hotel Roanoke]] as it appeared in 1910. N&W ordered an expansion to the hotel before the original structure was completed.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Piedmont |first=Donlan |title=Peanut Soup and Spoonbread: An Informal History of Hotel Roanoke |publisher=Virginia Tech Real Estate Foundation, Inc. |year=1994 |isbn=978-0-9617635-1-0 |page=16}}</ref>]]
In the early 1880s, Big Lick's residents voted to rename the town "Kimball" after [[Frederick J. Kimball]], an executive for the two railroad companies who played a significant role in their new location.{{r|Dotson|p=10}} Kimball turned down the honor, saying, "On the Roanoke River in Roanoke County&nbsp;– name it Roanoke."{{r|Barnes-1968|p=90}} The town obliged, officially becoming the Town of Roanoke on February 3, 1882.{{r|White-1982|p=65}} The new charter also [[Municipal annexation|annexed]] nearly {{convert|2.5|sqmi}} of additional land, including the Town of Gainesborough (later shortened to [[Gainsboro, Roanoke, Virginia|Gainsboro]]), which by that point had already become the center of the area's African American community.<ref>{{Cite web |last=City of Roanoke Planning Building and Development |title=Gainsboro Neighborhood Plan - History |url=https://www.roanokeva.gov/DocumentCenter/View/1232/Gainsboro |access-date=May 26, 2023 |website=Roanoke Document Center |archive-date=May 31, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230531171010/https://www.roanokeva.gov/DocumentCenter/View/1232/Gainsboro |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Shareef |first=Reginald |title=The Roanoke Valley's African American Heritage: A Pictorial History |publisher=The Donning Company |year=1996 |isbn=978-0-89865-962-7}}</ref>{{rp|153}} Kimball chose a wheat field north of the railroad tracks and east of Gainsboro for the N&W's new hotel,{{r|White-1982|p=66}} and the 69-room [[Hotel Roanoke]] – designed originally in the [[Queen Anne style architecture in the United States|Queen Anne]] style before numerous rebuilds and expansions gave it its current [[Tudor Revival architecture|Tudor Revival]] appearance – opened its doors in 1882.{{r|Dotson|p=12}}

With the rapid influx of railroad employees and others in associated industries, Roanoke's population soared and, by the end of 1883, had passed 5,000.{{r|White-1982|p=71}} That milestone made the town eligible for a [[Municipal charter|city charter]], and on January 31, 1884, the town became the City of Roanoke.{{r|Barnes-1968|p=135}}

With a population that ballooned from under 700 residents in 1880 to over 16,000 in 1890<ref name="DecennialCensus">{{cite web |url=https://hdl.handle.net/2027/umn.31951t00383932e |title=Census of Population:1950 |publisher=United States Census Bureau |hdl=2027/umn.31951t00383932e |access-date=August 2, 2023}}</ref> {{endash}} and earning itself the nickname "The Magic City" in the process{{r|Dotson|p=1}} {{endash}} Roanoke suffered many of the same difficulties that affected other 19th century [[boomtown]]s.<ref name=Dybdahl>{{cite news |last=Dybdahl |first=Pete |date=December 19, 2007 |title=Growing Pains |work=The Roanoke Times |page=1}}</ref> Its infrastructure was essentially nonexistent, and a lack of sewers combined with the area's [[Marsh|marshy terrain]] contributed to regular outbreaks of [[diphtheria]] and [[cholera]].{{r|Dotson|p=37}} [[Municipal bond|Bond initiatives]] designed to alleviate these and other issues highlighted racial tensions in the city, as the African American community – roughly 30 percent of Roanoke's population in 1891{{r|Dotson|p=105}} – opposed the measures because the money would only be used to improve white neighborhoods.{{r|Dotson|p=42}} Black neighborhoods in Roanoke typically received public amenities such as running water and paved roads only after their white counterparts, and Roanoke was among the first to adopt the [[Jim Crow laws]] that were becoming increasingly popular in the South.{{r|Dotson|p=108}} The local press, for its part, stoked the white population's fears and anxiety with near-constant reports of African American "savagery".{{r|Dotson|p=125}}<ref>{{Cite news |date=February 2, 1901 |title=Crime of the Century |work=The Roanoke Times |page=4}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |date=February 13, 1896 |title=Men Worse Than Apes |work=The Roanoke Times |page=3}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |date=May 1, 1894 |title=Brutal Work at Staunton |work=The Roanoke Times |page=1}}</ref>

In September 1893, tensions boiled over when a white woman was allegedly robbed and beaten by an African-American man, Thomas Smith, near the city's market.{{r|White-1982|p=78}} Smith was held in the city jail; a mob of hundreds surrounded the building and demanded "[[Lynching|lynch justice]]".{{r|Dotson|p=135}} A shootout between the mob and an undermanned militia ensued, leaving eight dead and thirty-one more injured. Included among the wounded was the city's mayor, the previously widely admired [[Henry S. Trout]],{{r|Dotson|p=134}} who had vowed protection of the prisoner.{{r|White-1982|p=79}} The rioting mob was eventually successful in gaining control of Smith. They proceeded to hang him and mutilate his body, which was eventually burned when the mob was deterred from its initial plan to bury it in Mayor Trout's front yard.{{r|Dotson|p=140}} The mayor himself was forced to flee the city out of fear for his life and only returned a week later after the national press condemned the riot and praised Trout's courage during the event.{{r|Dotson|p=145}}