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Raleigh became a state in 1792 being an administration center rather than a business center. Initially appearing to be a dull and sleepy town, Raleigh was to grow and become the capital city of North Carolina State. Currently, Raleigh stands out to be the largest municipality of the 12 municipalities of Wake County characterized by a population of over 600,000 residents; African Americans, Asian Americans, Whites and Hispanic ethnicities. Raleigh harbors a plethora of museums theaters together with recreational parks, all closely connected with its history and inhabitants.
Raleigh has undergone remarkable changes in terms of its central focus, education, business, housing and demographics since 1960s. Raleigh is famous for being one of the town in which some of the pertinent civil right movement activities were carried out. For instance, the renowned Civil Rights sit-ins took place in Raleigh with the activists holding some of their conferences at Shaw University (Carson, 1995). The sit-ins were used by African American to obtain equality in lunch counters; the lunch counters were only meant to serve the whites and not the blacks. It is also abundantly clear that Raleigh town provided an opportunity and further amelioration for black students’ education and civil rights that was achieved significantly from educational institutions like Saint Augustine’s college and Shaw University.
Raleigh’s oldest park is called the Pullen Park. The park was founded by Richard Stanhope Pullen in 1887 (Mobley, 2003). Pullen Park boosts of recreational facilities that suite all ages. The park harbors the Andy and Opie Statue, the famous Denttzel Menagerie, an art center indoor Olympic sized pool, together with an aquatic center together. The park was designed to accommodate only a small multitude of people. However, park has since been updated to accommodate more people with a radical facelift carried out in the year 2000. In the same light, contrary to the early years in which the Jim Crow laws prohibited the blacks from using the park, the park is nowadays open to all, regardless of one race and skin color.
The building, the structure of the city and the neighborhood offers several ways in reflecting and depicting the history of the city. A lot of information to deduce the historic significance is achieved through some aspects like the colors and photographs. A clear example in this case is the Masonic temple building, which was the first building, in the state to use the new technology and the sophisticated innovations. The building was later renamed the Alexander Building. Again, the building was renovated fully in the 1980s. The commission in charge of the historic sites had also gained the powers and capability to preserve, restore and improve the historic sites. The neighborhood had also affirmed the ideology of providing a better ground for modernism which was highly achieved through architectural movement and design.
The population of Raleigh has been increasing rapidly, and this is attributed to the better living conditions due to better infrastructure, water and electricity supplies. The rapid population growth has amounted to growth of neighborhoods, industrialization, and expansion of businesses. There is also a notable change in the role ascribed to women in the society, which was achieved after long campaigns of women rights and movements, and the amendment of the constitution to protect the women rights. Moreover, the capital health facilities have also propagated a healthy population, and it has enabled a sustainable medical care for the old and the physically challenged.
References
Anderson, N. D., & Fowle B. T. (1996). Raleigh: North Carolina's Capital City on Postcards. Chicago: Arcadia Publishing.
Carson, C. (1995). In struggle: SNCC and the Black awakening of the 1960s. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Mobley, J. A (Ed) (2003). The way we lived in North Carolina. North Carolina: The University of North Carolina Press.
