Monroe is the ninth-largest city in the U.S. state of Louisiana, and is the parish seat and largest city of Ouachita Parish. With a 2020 census-tabulated population of 47,702,[3] it is the principal city of the Monroe metropolitan statistical area, the second-largest metropolitan area in North Louisiana.

Etymology

As governor of Louisiana, Esteban Rodríguez Miró had Fort Miro built in 1791.[6] Fort Miro changed its name to Monroe to commemorate the first arrival of the steamboat James Monroe in the spring of 1820.[7] The ship's arrival was the single event, in the minds of local residents, that transformed the outpost into a town.

Credit for the name is indirectly given to James Monroe of Virginia, the fifth President of the United States, for whom the ship was named. The steamboat is depicted in a mural at the main branch of the Ouachita Parish Public Library.

History

Early history–late 20th century

Monroe's origins date back to the Spanish colonial period.

A steam towboat on the Ouachita River arriving at Monroe with a tow, 1929

Fort Miro changed its name to Monroe to commemorate the first arrival of the steamboat James Monroe in the spring of 1820 (see "Etymology" above).[7]

In 1913, Joseph A. Biedenharn, the first bottler of Coca-Cola, moved to Monroe from Vicksburg, Mississippi. Biedenharn and his son Malcolm were among the founders of Delta Air Lines, originally Delta Dusters. That company was founded in Tallulah, Louisiana in Madison Parish. It was based on products and processes developed by the Agriculture Experimental Station to dust crops from airplanes in order to combat the devastating effects that the boll weevil had on cotton crops. Biedenharn's home and gardens have been preserved and are now operated as the Biedenharn Museum and Gardens and are open to the public.[9]

Collett E. Woolman, the Ouachita Parish agent, was originally from Indiana. He pioneered crop dusting to eradicate the boll weevil, which destroyed cotton throughout the Mississippi Delta in the early 20th century. Woolman originated the first crop-dusting service in the world.[10] The collapse of cotton production meant a widespread loss of farm jobs, which contributed to the early-20th-century Great Migration, when a total of 1.5 million African Americans left the rural South for jobs in northern and midwestern cities. They were also escaping the oppressive racial conditions and violence under Jim Crow and the disenfranchisement that excluded most blacks from the political system.

Howard D. Griffin (1911–1986) purchased a boat dealership in 1936 while a student at what became the University of Louisiana Monroe. By the 1960s, Griffin's company had become the world's largest outboard motor dealership, and he also sold motorcycles. From 1955 to 1985, Griffin and his wife, Birdie M. Griffin (1915–1985), operated their seasonal Land O' Toys store in Monroe.[11]