Regensburg is a city in eastern Bavaria, at the confluence of the Danube, Naab and Regen rivers. It is the capital of the Upper Palatinate subregion of the state in the south of Germany. With more than 150,000 inhabitants, Regensburg is the fourth-largest city in the State of Bavaria after Munich, Nuremberg and Augsburg. From its foundation as an imperial Roman river fort, the city has been the political, economic and cultural centre of the surrounding region; it is still known in the Romance languages as a cognate of its Latin name of "Ratisbona" (the version "Ratisbon" was long current in English). Later, under the rule of the Holy Roman Empire, it housed the Perpetual Diet of Regensburg.

The medieval centre of the city was made a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2006 because of its well-preserved architecture, being the biggest medieval city site north of the Alps, and the city's historical importance for assemblies during the Holy Roman Empire. In 2014, Regensburg was among the top sights and travel attractions in Germany.

History

Early history

The first settlements in the Regensburg area date from the Stone Age. The oldest Celtic name given to a settlement near Regensburg was Radasbona, a site where a Roman fort was built around AD 90. In 179, a major new Roman fort, called Castra Regina ("fortress by the river Regen"), was built for Legio III Italica during the reign of Emperor Marcus Aurelius. It was an important camp at the most northerly point of the Danube; it corresponds to what is today the core of Regensburg's Old City or Altstadt east of the Obere and Untere Bachgasse and west of the Schwanenplatz. It is believed that as early as the late Roman period the city was the seat of a bishop.

From the early 6th century, Regensburg was the seat of a ruling family known as the Agilolfings. From about 530 to the first half of the 13th century, it was the capital of Bavaria. The bishopric established by the Romans was re-established by St Boniface as the Bishopric of Regensburg in 739. In the late 8th century, Regensburg remained an important city during the reign of Charlemagne. In 792, Regensburg hosted the ecclesiastical section of Charlemagne's General Assembly, the bishops in council who condemned the heresy of the nontrinitarian adoptionism doctrine taught by their Spanish counterparts, Elipandus of Toledo and Felix of Urgell. After the partition of the Carolingian Empire in 843, the city became the seat of the Eastern Frankish ruler, Louis the German. Two years later, 14 Bohemian princes came to Regensburg to receive baptism there. This was the starting point of the Christianization of the Czechs, and the diocese of Regensburg became the mother diocese of that of Prague. These events had a wide impact on the cultural history of the Czech lands, as they were consequently part of the Roman Catholic and not the Slavic-Orthodox world. On 8 December 899 Arnulf of Carinthia, a descendant of Charlemagne, died at Regensburg.

By the High Middle Ages in the year 1000, the population increased to 40,000 from 23,000 inhabitants in 800. In 1096, on the way to the First Crusade, Peter the Hermit led a mob of crusaders who attempted to force the mass conversion of Jews in Regensburg, they then killed all those who resisted. Between 1135 and 1146, the Stone Bridge across the Danube was built at Regensburg. This bridge opened major international trade routes between northern Europe and Venice, and this began Regensburg's golden age as a residence of wealthy trading families. Regensburg became the cultural centre of southern Germany and was celebrated for its gold work and fabrics.

Late Middle Ages and early modern period

In 1245 Regensburg became a Free Imperial City and was a trade centre before the shifting of trade routes in the late Middle Ages. Regensburg has always been a place where international meetings were held. This was also the case in 1471 when a war against the Turks was to be decided. In 1486, Regensburg became part of the Duchy of Bavaria, but its independence was restored by the Holy Roman Emperor ten years later. The first Diet of Regensburg took place in 1541. The city adopted the Protestant Reformation in 1542 and its Town Council remained entirely Lutheran.

From 1663 to 1806, the city was the permanent seat of the Imperial Diet of the Holy Roman Empire, which became known as the Perpetual Diet of Regensburg. Thus, Regensburg was one of the central towns of the Empire, attracting visitors in large numbers.

A minority of the population remained Roman Catholic, and Roman Catholics were denied civic rights (). Although the Imperial city had adopted the Reformation, the town remained the seat of a Roman Catholic bishop and several abbeys. Three of these, St. Emmeram, Niedermünster and Obermünster, were free imperial estates within the Holy Roman Empire, meaning that they were granted a seat and a vote at the Imperial Diet (). So there was the unique situation that the town of Regensburg comprised five independent "states" (in terms of the Holy Roman Empire): the Protestant city itself, the Roman Catholic bishopric, and the three monasteries. In addition, it was seen as the traditional capital of the region Bavaria (not the state), acted as functional co-capital of the Empire (second to the Emperor's court at Vienna) due to the presence of the Perpetual Diet, and it was the residence of the Emperor's Commissary-Principal to the same diet, who with one very brief exception was a prince himself (for many years the Prince of Thurn and Taxis, still resident in the town).

Late modern period
In 1803 the city lost its status as an imperial city following its incorporation into the Principality of Regensburg. It was handed over to the Archbishop-Elector of Mainz and Archchancellor of the Holy Roman Empire Carl von Dalberg in compensation for the territory of the Electorate of Mainz located on the left bank of the Rhine which had been annexed by France under the terms of the Treaty of Lunéville in 1801. The Archbishopric of Mainz was formally transferred to Regensburg. Dalberg united the bishopric, the monasteries, and the town itself, making up the Principality of Regensburg (Fürstentum Regensburg). Dalberg strictly modernized public life. Most importantly, he awarded equal rights to Protestants and Roman Catholics alike. In 1810 Dalberg ceded Regensburg to the Kingdom of Bavaria, he himself being compensated by the award of Fulda and Hanau to him under the title of "Grand Duke of Frankfurt".

Between April 19 and April 23, 1809, Regensburg was the scene of the Battle of Ratisbon between forces commanded by Henri Gatien Bertrand and Napoleon himself and the retreating Austrian forces. The city was eventually overrun, after supplies and ammunition ran out. The city suffered severe damage during the fight, with about 150 houses being burnt and others being looted. Robert Browning's poem Incident at the French Camp describes the battle from the French perspective, but is filled with historical errors.

Nazism and World War II

The Jewish community was persecuted after the Nazi Party came to power in Germany in 1933, many Jews fled in the following years, and some were also expelled to Poland; thanks, however, to a Polish-German agreement they were allowed to return to the city. On November 9, 1938, during the Kristallnacht, the Regensburg Synagogue and several Jewish homes and stores were destroyed, and around 220 Jews were arrested, some were also deported to the Dachau concentration camp. During World War II, many Jews emigrated to various countries, and in 1942, over 200 Jews were deported either to Piaski in German-occupied Poland or the Theresienstadt Ghetto in German-occupied Czechoslovakia. In the final months of World War II, in March and April 1945, the Regensburg subcamp of the Flossenbürg concentration camp was located in the city, with 460 forced laborers of various nationalities, 40 of whom died.

Regensburg was home to both a Messerschmitt Bf 109 aircraft factory and an oil refinery, which were bombed by the Allies on August 17, 1943, in the Schweinfurt-Regensburg mission, and on February 5, 1945, during the Oil Campaign of World War II. Although both targets were badly damaged, Regensburg itself suffered little damage from the Allied strategic bombing campaign, and the nearly intact medieval city centre is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The city's most important cultural loss was that of the Romanesque church of Obermünster, which was destroyed in a March 1945 air raid and was not rebuilt (the belfry survived). Also, Regensburg's slow economic recovery after the war ensured that historic buildings were not torn down and replaced by newer ones. When the upswing in restoration reached Regensburg in the late 1960s, the prevailing mindset had turned in favour of preserving the city's heritage.

History after 1945

Between 1945 and 1949, Regensburg was the site of the largest displaced persons (DP) camp in Germany. At its peak in 1946–1947, the workers' district of Ganghofersiedlung housed almost 5,000 Ukrainian and 1,000 non-Ukrainian refugees and displaced persons. With the approval of U.S. Military Government in the American Allied Occupation Zone, Regensburg and other DP camps organised their own camp postal service. In Regensburg, the camp postal service began operation on December 11, 1946.

At the beginning of the 1960s, Regensburg invested heavily in technical and social infrastructure to attract industry. Siemens was the first multinational company to come to Regensburg, a significant step in the city's development after World War II. In 1965, Regensburg University was founded; Regensburg University of Applied Sciences was established in 1971. The second multinational company, BMW, arrived in 1986 and set up a large production plant. Since the 1990s, several well-known hightech companies have been located in Regensburg, such as Infineon and OSRAM, contributing to the city's current wealth.

In 1997, Regensburg was awarded the Europe Prize for its outstanding achievements in European integration.

The World Heritage Committee listed Regensburg's Old Town a UNESCO World Heritage Site in July 2006. It is one of the largest medieval old towns north of the Alps and very well preserved, with the nickname "Italy's most northern city". Close to the Stone Bridge, the city of Regensburg established a World Heritage Centre in the historic Salzstadl in 2007, where detailed information on Regensburg's 2000-year history is given.

Geography

Topography
Regensburg is situated on the northernmost part of the Danube river at the geological crossroads of four distinct landscapes:

to the north and northeast lies the Bavarian Forest with granite and gneiss mountains, wide forests and its national park
to the east and south-east is the fertile Danube plain (Gäuboden) which are highly cultivated loess plains
the south is dominated by the Tertiary Hill Country, a continuation of Alpine Foreland
to the West is Franconian Jura

Climate
Regensburg straddles the humid continental (Dfb) and oceanic (Cfb) climate zones under the Köppen climate classification. While the average temperature of  in the period from 1971 to 2000 is slightly above the German average (), still only 5 of the 80 cities in Germany above 100,000 inhabitants are colder. The average precipitation of  per year ranges slightly below the German average (approximately ). For the newer period from 1981 to 2010 the average temperature and precipitation rose up to  respectively . As this increase in the average temperature can also be seen in the other cities, Regensburg still ranks fifth place (shared with Ingolstadt and Kiel) in the above-mentioned ranking. With a total of 1670 sunshine hours per year, Regensburg is roughly 120 hours above German average.

The warmest month of the year, on average, is July. The coolest month of the year, on average, is January.

Main sights

City

Regensburg includes the largest medieval old town north of the Alps with nearly 1,500 listed buildings and a picturesque cityscape. Its most famous sights are located mainly in the Old Town, such as:

The Dom (Cathedral) is an example of pure German Gothic and is regarded as the main work of Gothic architecture in Bavaria. It was founded in 1275 and completed in 1634, with the exception of the towers, which were finished in 1869. The interior contains numerous interesting monuments, including one of Peter Vischer's masterpieces. Adjoining the cloisters are two chapels which predate the cathedral. One of these, known as the old cathedral, goes back perhaps to the 8th century. The official choir for the liturgical music at St Peter's Cathedral is the famous Regensburger Domspatzen ("cathedral sparrows").
The stone bridge, built 1135–1146, is a highlight of medieval bridge building. The knights of the 2nd and 3rd crusades used it to cross the Danube on their way to the Holy Land.
The Regensburg Sausage Kitchen is a major tourist destination, but locals eat there as well. It was originally built as the construction headquarters of the stone bridge and now lies adjacent to it.
Remains of the Roman fortress' walls including the Porta Praetoria.
The Church of St. James, also called Schottenkirche, a Romanesque basilica of the 12th century, derives its name from the monastery of Irish Benedictines (Scoti) to which it was attached; the principal doorway is covered with very unusual grotesque carvings. It stands next to the Jakobstor, a medieval city gate named after it.
The old parish church of St. Ulrich is a good example of the Transition style of the 13th century, and contains a valuable antiquarian collection. It houses the diocesan museum of religious art.
Examples of the Romanesque basilica style are the church of Obermünster, dating from 1010, and the abbey church of St. Emmeram, built in the 13th century, remarkable as one of the few German churches with a detached bell tower. The cloisters of the ancient abbey, one of the oldest in Germany, are still in a fair state of preservation. In 1809 the conventual buildings were converted into a palace for the prince of Thurn and Taxis, hereditary postmaster-general of the Holy Roman Empire.
The Adler-Apotheke, located nearby the Regensburg Cathedral, was founded in 1610 and is one of the oldest pharmacies in Regensburg. The ancient interior and historical vessels can be viewed.
Wealthy patrician families competed against each other to see who could build the highest tower of the city. In 1260, the Goldener Turm (golden tower) was built on Wahlenstraße.
The Old Town Hall, dating in part from the 14th century, contains the rooms occupied by the Imperial Diet from 1663 to 1806.
The Gasthof zum Goldenen Kreuz (Golden Cross Inn) is also of historical interest: it is where Charles V made the acquaintance of Barbara Blomberg, the mother of Don John of Austria.
The statue of John of Austria, born 1547 in Regensburg, was erected 1978 on the fourth centenary of his death and is a copy of a monument in Messina, Italy.
Perhaps the most pleasant modern building in the city is the Gothic villa of the king of Bavaria on the bank of the Danube. The grounds are now opened to public and known as VillaPark.
Among the public institutions of the city are the public library, picture gallery, botanical garden, and the institute for the making of stained glass. The city's colleges (apart from the University of Regensburg) include an episcopal clerical seminary, and a school of church music.
St. Emmeram's Abbey, now known as Schloss Thurn und Taxis, is a huge castle owned by the powerful Thurn and Taxis family.
Schloss Höfling, a castle owned by the Thurn und Taxis family
The City Park, the oldest and largest park in Regensburg with a lot of artwork.
The Botanischer Garten der Universität Regensburg is a modern botanical garden located on the University of Regensburg campus.
Herzogspark also contains several small botanical gardens.

Surroundings

Near Regensburg there are two very imposing classical buildings erected by Ludwig I of Bavaria as national monuments dedicated to German patriotism and greatness:
The more imposing of the two is the Walhalla, a costly reproduction of the Parthenon, erected as a Teutonic temple of fame on a hill rising from the Danube at Donaustauf,  to the east. The interior, which is richly decorated with coloured marble, gilding and sculptures, contains the busts of more than one hundred notable Germans.
The second of King Ludwig's buildings is the Befreiungshalle at Kelheim,  higher up the Danube. It is a large circular monument built for the glorification of the heroes of the 1813 War of Liberation.

Weltenburg Abbey (Kloster Weltenburg), a Benedictine monastery, is located in Weltenburg near the town of Kelheim. The abbey is situated on a peninsula of the Danube, by what are known as the "Weltenburg Narrows" or "Danube Gorge". The monastery, founded by Irish or Scottish monks in about 620, is said to be the oldest monastery in Bavaria.

To the east of Regensburg lies the Bavarian Forest and its National Park, one of the most visited protected areas in Germany.

Regensburg is on the designated heritage route, the Route of Emperors and Kings.

Culture

Museums and exhibitions
There are 20 museums in Regensburg. The Regensburg Museum of History covers the history, culture and arts of Regensburg and Eastern Bavaria from the Stone Age to the present. The Imperial Diet Museum (Reichstagsmuseum) in the Old Town Hall presents life during the Holy Roman Empire. Its main attractions are an original torture chamber and the Reichssaal, the rooms occupied by the Imperial Diet from 1663 to 1806. The Kepler Memorial House (Keplergedächtnishaus) illustrates the life of the famous astronomer and mathematician Johannes Kepler. The Municipal Art Gallery (Leerer Beutel) houses art collections, film events and cultural festivals. The city has also added several outdoor museums, known as "Document" sites, which give an overview of specific topics such as Roman, Jewish and Bavarian history.

In addition, there are the Diocese Museums (Bistumsmuseen) of Regensburg and a branch of the Bavarian National Museum located in St. Emmeram's Abbey, which contains the Princely Treasure Chamber of the Thurn und Taxis family. The Domschatzmuseum where church treasures, monstrances and tapestries are displayed is in St. Peter's Cathedral. Other museums include the Kunstforum Ostdeutsche Galerie, the Naturkundemuseum Ostbayern, the Reptile Zoo, the Regensburg Museum of Danube Shipping (Donau-Schiffahrts-Museum), the Public Observatory Regensburg as well as the Watch Museum (Uhrenmuseum), the Golf Museum, the Post Museum and the Dinoraeum. To celebrate its centenary in 2018, the State of Bavaria opened the Museum of Bavarian History in Regensburg. In 2023 a Dackelmuseum (Dachshund museum) opened. There are also guided tours of most of the historical monuments in Regensburg, as well as organized tours of the city available in several languages.

Theaters

The Theater Regensburg on the Bismarckplatz was established in 1804 and is the city's most important theater. Operas, operettas, musicals and ballets are performed there. In the summer open-air performances also take place. While the theater on the Bismarckplatz is the city's oldest and largest, the Theater Regensburg also has four other stages with programmes that complement each other. In the Neuhaussaal of the theater on the Bismarckplatz, concerts by the Philharmonic Orchestra Regensburg take place. The Velodrom Theater presents musicals and plays. In the Haidplatz Theater it is  mainly literary and modern plays that are performed, whereas the Turmtheater at the Goliathplatz puts on cabarets, musicals and plays for children as well as modern plays.

Music
Regensburg is home to the famous Regensburger Domspatzen, the cathedral choir that specializes in liturgy but has toured internationally with a wide variety of music. The Regensburger Schlossfestspiele has been held in the inner courtyard of the St. Emmeram's Abbey every July from 2003, sponsored by the former princely house of Thurn und Taxis. Meanwhile, those were attracting musicians like Elton John, David Garrett, Tom Jones, or Plácido Domingo. Modern music styles, especially jazz, are presented every summer during the Bavarian Jazz weekend during which over a hundred bands, combos, and soloists perform in the Old Town. In 2015, the House of Music was opened, giving a home to skilled musicians and their education.

Film and cinema
The international short film season is hosted annually in Regensburg. It is a non-profit event and takes place every March, being one of the most important of its type in Germany. Aside, there are several cinemas, such as CinemaxX, the largest one showing blockbusters and arthouse films, and smaller independent cinemas such as Garbo, Ostentor Kino and Regina Filmtheater. Regensburg has two open air cinemas as well.

Dialect
Although the German language is Germany's official language, Regensburg is considered a part of the Bavarian dialect language area () which encompasses much of Bavaria, Austria, and the South Tyrolean region of northern Italy. More specifically, the dialect attributed to Regensburg is called Central Bavarian (). A 2019 report estimates that about half of Bavaria's 12 million inhabitants speak a variation of the Bavarian dialect.

The first dictionary of a German dialect was Johann Ludwig Prasch's . Published in Regensburg in 1689, it contains 500 words from the Bavarian variation spoken in Regensburg. Regensburg's Bauerntheater, a type of farmers' or folk theater, has staged plays delivered in Bavarian for over 90 years. Moreover, premiering in 2011, Joseph Berlinger's play "Mei Fähr Lady," a story about three "students" taking a crash course in Bavarian dialect, has been performed at Regensburg's Turmtheater over 300 times. In fact, the role of the dialect professor is played by Ludwig Zehetner, professor emeritus in Bavarian dialectology at University of Regensburg. Manfred Rohm, whose pen name Sepp Grantelhauer takes on the Bavarian verb  for "to complain," writes a weekly satirical column solely in Bavarian for the .

Buildings
The Old Town of Regensburg with nearly 1,500 listed buildings offers a huge cultural diversity from Roman to modern times.

Recreation
The Old Town of Regensburg is surrounded completely by a green belt. Numerous inner-city parks like the City Park (Stadtpark), the Herzogspark, the Dörnbergpark, the Villapark or the university's botanical garden are a source for recreation and leisure.

Memorial sites
The city of Regensburg has erected several memorials to combat racism, intolerance towards minorities, and all other forms of contempt for human dignity:
 Memorial for victims of the Holocaust
 Memorial for victims of forced "euthanasia"
 Memorial for concentration camp inmates and prisoners of war
 Memorial for violence against women

Particular to Regensburg are the so-called Stolpersteine (stumbling stones) in honor of Jews deported during Nazism.

Events
Twice a year the Regensburg Dult takes place. This is the city's Volksfest, which is Bavaria's fourth largest. The Bürgerfest (citizen celebration) in the Old Town is held every two years, attracting over 100,000 visitors. Every second weekend in July, people dressed as knights and other medieval characters come together at the Regensburg Spectaculum, a medieval market, near the Stone Bridge. Every December, there are several Christmas markets all over the city.

Nightlife
With over 500 bars, restaurants, clubs, and other venues in the inner city alone, Regensburg provides a rich and diverse nightlife due to its young population.

Demographics

Population
In May 2017, Regensburg had 164,896 inhabitants, making it the fourth largest city in Bavaria. Over the last hundred years, the city has experienced a strong increase in population, surpassing 100,000 inhabitants in 1945 due to Germans who were expelled from various Eastern and Central European countries, at the end of the war. Today, Regensburg is one of the fastest-growing cities in Germany.

International communities
Nearly 12% of the total population are foreign residents. Most of them come from Middle east and Southeastern Europe:

Religion
A relative majority of Regensburg's population is Catholic. In 2020, about 48% of the city's inhabitants identified with the Catholic Church, 12.4% were registered Protestants and about 39.6% identified with other religions or did not have any registered religious affiliation.

Politics
The city of Regensburg falls within the Regensburg electoral district, a constituency of the German federal parliament in Berlin (the Bundestag).

Government
The mayor and the City Council are elected for a period of six years. Both elections take place at the same time. The City Council is composed of 51 members and includes the mayor, two deputy mayors, five counsellors and the other council members.

The municipal elections in Bavaria of 2020 delivered the following results:

Boroughs
Regensburg is subdivided into 18 boroughs (Stadtbezirke): Innenstadt, Stadtamhof, Steinweg-Pfaffenstein, Sallern-Gallingkofen, Konradsiedlung-Wutzlhofen, Brandlberg-Keilberg, Reinhausen, Weichs, Schwabelweis, Ostenviertel, Kasernenviertel, Galgenberg, Kumpfmühl-Ziegetsdorf-Neuprüll, Großprüfening-Dechbetten-Königswiesen, Westenviertel, Ober- und Niederwinzer-Kager, Oberisling-Graß, Burgweinting-Harting. Each borough contains a number of localities (Ortsteile), which can have historic roots in older municipalities that became urbanized and incorporated into the city.

Twin towns – sister cities

Regensburg is twinned with:

 Aberdeen, United Kingdom (1955)
 Brixen, Italy (1969)
 Clermont-Ferrand, France (1969)
 Tempe, United States (1976)
 Plzeň, Czech Republic (1993)
 Odesa, Ukraine (1980)
 Budavár (Budapest), Hungary (2005)
 Qingdao, China (2009)

Economy
Regensburg's economy counts among the most dynamic and fastest growing in Germany. Focus is on manufacturing industries, such as automotive, industrial and electrical engineering.

Companies
There are several multinational corporations located in Regensburg, such as BMW, Continental, E.ON, General Electric, Infineon, Osram, Schneider Electric, Siemens, Telekom,  Vitesco Technologies and Toshiba as well as hidden champions (Krones, MR).

BMW operates an automobile production plant in Regensburg; the Regensburg BMW plant produces 3 Series, 1 Series and (previously) Z4 vehicles. Continental AG, with the headquarters of its car component business, Osram Opto-Semiconductors, SGB-SMIT Group transformers and Siemens as well as Infineon, the former Siemens semiconductor branch, provide a high level of innovation and technical development in Regensburg. Other well known international companies, such as AREVA, Schneider Electric and Toshiba, have built plants in or near Regensburg. GE Aviation founded a greenfield site to innovate, develop and produce turbine machinery components with a new manufacturing casting technology. Amazon.com located its first German customer service centre in Regensburg. The hidden champions Maschinenfabrik Reinhausen (MR) and Krones are both headquartered in or close to Regensburg and are among the major employers.

Aside from the industrial sector, tourism contributes a lot to Regensburg's economical growth, especially since 2006, when the city gained status as UNESCO World Heritage Site. The University of Regensburg, the Regensburg University of Applied Sciences and mercantile trade also play major roles in Regensburg's economy. Increasingly, biotech companies were founded in Regensburg over the last two decades and have their headquarters and laboratories in the city's "BioPark". Another focus is on information technology, with the city running a start-up centre for IT firms. One of these former start-ups, CipSoft, now is a known video game company still based in Regensburg.

OTTI, the Eastern Bavaria Technology Transfer-Institut e.V., is headquartered in Regensburg.

Tourism
The city recorded 912,238 overnight hotel stays and 531,943 hotel guests in 2012. Tourism figures have nearly doubled within the last 15 years and Regensburg has become one of the most-visited German cities from 100,000 to 500,000 residents. In 2014, Regensburg was ranked as a Top-30 travel attraction in Germany by international tourists.

Infrastructure

Transport

Regensburg Hauptbahnhof (central station) is connected to lines to Munich, Nuremberg, Passau, Weiden and Hof and Ingolstadt and Ulm. The city lies also on two motorways, the A3 from Cologne and Frankfurt to Vienna, and the A93 from Holledau to Hof.

The local transport is provided by a bus network run by the RVV (Regensburger Verkehrsverbund).

Energy
Regensburg's energy is mainly supplied by the German company E.ON, one of the world's largest electric utility service providers. Its subsidiary Bayernwerk runs the local hydropower station in the Danube River. In 2012, about 9.1% of the total electricity consumption was generated by renewable energy sources, about 5.1% of the total heat consumption were generated by renewables. Both figures show, that Regensburg is behind other Bavarian cities in this context. Therefore, the municipal government presented an energy plan in 2014, which should enhance the transformation towards renewable energy sources over the next decade.

Health
Regensburg has one of the most modern university hospitals in Europe, the Universitätsklinikum Regensburg. In addition there are several other well-known hospitals such as the Krankenhaus Barmherzige Brüder and the St. Josef-Krankenhaus. Psychiatric illnesses are treated in the Bezirksklinikum. With 19.4 hospital beds per 1000 residents, Regensburg has the fourth-highest ratio of beds to residents in Germany as well as the third-highest ratio of medical doctors to residents in Germany (339 per 100,000 residents).

The city's BioPark, home to Bavaria's second largest biotech cluster, hosts numerous research institutions and biotech companies.

Education

Universities and academia
Regensburg is known for its higher education institutions, the largest being the University of Regensburg. Founded in 1962, it is one of Germany's newest universities and ranked among the Top 400 universities worldwide. Among the prominent intellectuals associated with the university are Pope Benedict XVI, Udo Steiner and Wolfgang Wiegard. The campus is situated in a single location together with the Regensburg University of Applied Sciences.

Since 1874 there has been a College of Catholic Music in the city, the Hochschule für Katholische Kirchenmusik und Musikpädagogik Regensburg.

Research
In addition to the research centres and institutes of the universities, there are several research institutions situated in the city of Regensburg. Among them are the Leibniz-Institute for East and Southeast European Studies (IOS), the Regensburg Centre for Interventional Immunology (RCI), the Fraunhofer Institute for Toxicology and Experimental Medicine (ITEM) and the BioPark, the Bavarian biotech cluster.

Schools
There are eighteen elementary schools in Regensburg. The city also has several secondary education institutions, both public and private, representing all levels of the German school system. There are eight Gymnasien, five Realschulen, six Hauptschulen and four vocational schools (Berufsschulen). In addition, there are several folk high schools with different specialisations.

The SIS Swiss International School provides international educational. Founded in 2002, the Sportinternat Regensburg was Europe's first baseball boarding school.

Sports

Football
SSV Jahn Regensburg is the local football club and attracts a fairly large local following. The team was part of a larger sports club founded in 1889 as Turnerbund Jahn Regensburg which took its name from Friedrich Ludwig Jahn, whose ideas of gymnastics greatly influenced German sport in the 19th century. The football department was created in 1907. The footballers and swimmers left their parent club in 1924 to form Sportbund Jahn Regensburg.

Ice hockey
 is the local ice hockey club, currently playing in the DEL2, Germany's second highest professional league.

Baseball
Regensburg Legionäre is the baseball and softball club from Regensburg. The team is also known as Buchbinder Legionäre, following a sponsorship of the Buchbinder company. The club plays in the German Bundesliga and is one of the most famous and most successful baseball clubs in Germany. Several players now in the MLB formerly played at the club. Its arena, Armin-Wolf-Arena, was built in 1996 and has a capacity of 10,000 spectators, making it to Germany's largest baseball stadium.

Athletics
The local athletics club, LG TELIS FINANZ Regensburg, offers a wide range of different competitions and is counted among the most successful clubs in Germany.

Notable people

 Saint Emmeram (died 652), Christian bishop and a martyr, St. Emmeram's Abbey
 Wolfgang of Regensburg (ca.934–994), Bishop of Regensburg
 Ulrich of Zell (ca.1029–1093), Cluniac reformer of Germany, abbot, founder and saint
 Petachiah of Ratisbon, a 12th–13th century rabbi, best known for his extensive travels throughout Eastern Europe, the Caucasus, and the Middle East
 Judah ben Samuel of Regensburg, a 12th–13th century rabbi and mystic, founder of Chassidei Ashkenaz
 Albertus Magnus (ca.1206–1280), scholastic philosopher and polymath.
 Konrad of Megenberg (1309–1374), scholar and academic
 Albrecht Altdorfer (ca.1480–1538), printmaker, painter of landscapes, historical and Biblical subjects.
 Ulrich Schmidl (1510-1579 in Regensburg), supposed co-founder of Buenos Aires
 John of Austria (1547–1578), the illegitimate son of Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor.
 Johannes Kepler (1571–1630), mathematician and astronomer.
 Princely House of Thurn und Taxis (1608–1806), a German noble family and one of Europe's largest landowners
 Johann Georg Gichtel (1638–1710), was a German mystic and religious leader, critic of Lutheranism
 Emanuel Schikaneder (1751–1812), impresario, actor, singer, composer and librettist of The Magic Flute
 Charles von Hügel (1795–1870), Austrian army officer, diplomat, botanist, and explorer.
 Elise Barensfeld (1796–after 1820), soprano
 Joseph Hanisch (1812–1892), musician, composer and organist
 The Rev. Dr. Franz Xaver Haberl (1840-1910), Roman Catholic musician, teacher of Lorenzo Perosi
 Maximilian Oberst (1849–1925), physician and surgeon
 Anton Vilsmeier (1894–1962), German chemist best known for the Vilsmeier-Haack reaction, born in Burgweinting, which is now part of Regensburg, and attended the Altes Gymnasium in Regensburg
 Ludwig Bemelmans (1898–1962), Austro-Hungarian born American writer of children's books and internationally renowned gourmet, spent his early life in Regensburg
 Oskar Schindler (1908–1974), German industrialist, and humanitarian, emigrated to Argentina after WW2
 Anton Hackl (1915–1984), Luftwaffe Flying Ace
 Pope Benedict XVI (1927–2022), professor of theology at the University of Regensburg from 1969 to 1977, who retained the title honorary professor; made an honorary citizen in 2006
 Walter Röhrl (born 1947), racing driver
 Allan Zeman (born 1949), Hong Kong businessman
 Andrea Maria Schenkel (born 1962), best-selling author of Tannöd and other works
 Ulrich Eberl (born 1962), science and technology journalist
 Christian Jagodzinski (born ca.1965), multimillionaire, entrepreneur, and investor; Co-founder of Telebuch.de which became Amazon.com's presence in Germany; grew up in Regensburg, lives in Miami
 Hisham Zreiq (born 1968), award-winning Palestinian Christian Independent filmmaker, poet and visual artist
 Willie Duncan guitarist in Spider Murphy Gang (formed 1977)
 Elisabeth Elli Erl (born 1979), winner of German Pop Idol 2004 – singer and teacher
 Benjamin Appl (born 1982), German-British lyric baritone
 Simone Laudehr (born 1986), German national team footballer, women's world cup champion 2007

Gallery

See also

 History of the Jews in Regensburg
 List of mayors of Regensburg
 List of the prince-bishops and bishops of Regensburg
 Regensburg (district)

Notes

References

Sources
 David L. Sheffler, Schools and Schooling in Late Medieval Germany: Regensburg, 1250–1500 (Leiden, Brill, 2008) (Education and Society in the Middle Ages and Renaissance, 33).

External links

 Old town of Regensburg with Stadtamhof  UNESCO Official Website
 Explore the Old town of Regensburg with Stadtamhof in the UNESCO collection on Google Arts and Culture

 Virtual tour of Regensburg
 Stone Bridge of Regensburg Digital Media Archive (creative commons-licensed photos, laser scans, panoramas), mainly covering the medieval Stone Bridge but also including surrounding areas, with data from a Christofori und Partner/CyArk research partnership
 Regensburg – Pictures, Sights and more
Great privilege for Regensburg by King Philip of Swabia for Regensburg from 1207 taken from the collections of the Lichtbildarchiv älterer Originalurkunden at Marburg University
 "Here Their Stories Will Be Told…" The Valley of the Communities at Yad Vashem, Regensburg, at Yad Vashem website.
 Chiptuning Regensburg

1803 disestablishments
States and territories established in 1245

Populated places on the Danube
Bavarian Circle
Medieval German architecture
Displaced persons camps in the aftermath of World War II
World Heritage Sites in Germany
Roman fortifications in Raetia
States and territories disestablished in 1803

Regensburg


Hon. Carl W. Ford, Jr. (born 1943) is an American political scientist, consultant, defense administrator, and Asian specialist originally from Hot Springs, Arkansas.  As Assistant Secretary of State for Intelligence and Research, he headed the Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) in the State Department from 2001 until 2003. He reported directly to then Secretary of State Colin Powell.

Biography
Ford holds a Bachelor of Arts in Asian studies and a Master of Arts in East Asian studies from Florida State University at Tallahassee. He is an Independent politically.

From 1965 to 1989, Ford served two tours of duty in Vietnam, was a United States Army military intelligence officer, a United States Defense Intelligence Agency China strategic intelligence officer, a Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) China military analyst, a professional staff member for East Asia on the Committee on Foreign Relations, and the United States National Intelligence Officer for East Asia at the CIA.

Beginning in early 1989, Carl Ford spent four years working in the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD). He first served as the Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for International Security Affairs (ISA) and concurrently as the Deputy Assistant Secretary for East Asia. After the Gulf War he became the Deputy Assistant for the Middle East and South Asia while keeping his principal deputy position. He remained on as acting assistant secretary until a Bill Clinton administration selection could be confirmed.

In 1993, Ford established Ford and Associates, his own international consulting firm in Washington, D.C. to provide strategic and tactical advice to American companies such as Lockheed Martin, Boeing, and Raytheon doing business with the militaries of Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan.

Ford joined the State Department as the United States Assistant Secretary of State for Intelligence and Research (INR) on the appointment of President George W. Bush in May 2001. He was also directly involved in crafting policy related to the war on terrorism, the Iraq War and reconstruction, and issues regarding the Chinese military, nuclear proliferation, the Middle East peace process, and the North Korean military threat.

In the fall of 2003, Ford joined Cassidy & Associates, a firm specializing in international policy and defense issues, with a particular focus on East Asia and the Middle East. He held the position of executive vice president until retiring in February 2006. He served as an adjunct professor at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service, where he led a seminar on Executive Branch decision-making, and taught a graduate course on intelligence theory and practice at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. He is currently an adjunct at National Park College in Hot Springs, Arkansas, teaching American national government and state and local government.

In 2020, Ford, along with over 130 other former Republican national security officials, signed a statement that asserted that President Trump was unfit to serve another term, and "To that end, we are firmly convinced that it is in the best interest of our nation that Vice President Joe Biden be elected as the next President of the United States, and we will vote for him."

Quotes
Ford stated on CNN's documentary Dead Wrong: Inside an Intelligence Meltdown (2005) that the United States' intelligence departments "threw everything they had" into Colin Powell's speech talking about the prospects of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq which led to the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
Carl Ford called John R. Bolton "Kiss-Up, Kick-Down Sort of Guy" on Democracy Now! April 13, 2005.

See also

CIA leak grand jury investigation
Plame Affair

References

External links

U.S. Department of State
Bureau of Intelligence and Research
 PBS Frontline interview, January 10, 2006
 Ex-State Dept. Intel Chief Calls Bolton "Kiss-Up, Kick-Down Sort of Guy" Democracy Now, April 13, 2005
Speeches
Statement Before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Washington, DC February 11, 2003
State Department Press Briefing
April 7, 2005
April 21, 2005

1943 births
Living people
People from Hot Springs, Arkansas
People from Washington, D.C.
American political scientists
United States Assistant Secretaries of State
Arkansas Independents
Florida State University alumni
United States Army personnel of the Vietnam War
United States Department of Defense officials
Assistant Secretaries of State for Intelligence and Research
United States Army soldiers

Carl W. Ford Jr.


Franklin D. Roosevelt's relationship with Civil Rights was a complicated one. While he was popular among African Americans, Catholics and Jews, he has in retrospect received heavy criticism for the ethnic cleansing of Mexican Americans in the 1930s known as the Mexican Repatriation and his internment of Japanese Americans during the Second World War. From its creation under the National Housing Act of 1934 signed into law by Roosevelt, official Federal Housing Administration (FHA) property appraisal underwriting standards to qualify for mortgage insurance had a whites-only requirement excluding all racially mixed neighborhoods or white neighborhoods in proximity to black neighborhoods, and the FHA used its official mortgage insurance underwriting policy explicitly to prevent school desegregation.

Mexican Repatriation

From his first term until 1939, the Mexican Repatriation started by President Herbert Hoover continued under Roosevelt, which some scholars today contend was a form of ethnic cleansing towards Mexican Americans. Roosevelt ended federal involvement in the deportations. After 1934, the number of deportations fell by approximately 50 percent. However, Roosevelt did not attempt to suppress the deportations on a local or state level. Mexican Americans were the only group within the United States explicitly excluded from New Deal benefits.

Executive Order 8802
In June 1941, Roosevelt issued Executive Order 8802, which created the Fair Employment Practice Committee (FEPC). It was the most important federal move in support of the rights of African-Americans between Reconstruction and the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The President's order stated that the federal government would not hire any person based on their race, color, creed, or national origin in the federal government or defense-related administration. The FEPC enforced the order to ban discriminatory hiring within the federal government and in corporations that received federal contracts.

Millions of black men and women achieved better jobs and better pay as a result. The war brought the race issue to the forefront. The Army had been segregated since the Civil War, and the Navy since the Wilson administration. But by 1940, the African-American vote had largely shifted from Republican to Democrat, and African-American leaders like Walter Francis White of the NAACP and T. Arnold Hill of the Urban League had become recognized as part of the Roosevelt coalition.

In June 1941, at the urging of A. Philip Randolph, the leading African-American trade unionist, Roosevelt signed an executive order establishing the Fair Employment Practice Committee and prohibiting discrimination by any government agency, including the armed forces. In practice, the services, particularly the Navy and the Marines, found ways to evade this order, and the Marine Corps remained all-white until 1942.

In September 1942, at Eleanor's instigation, Roosevelt met with a delegation of African-American leaders, who demanded full integration into the forces, including the right to serve in combat roles and in the Navy, the Marine Corps and the United States Army Air Forces. Roosevelt agreed, but did nothing to implement his promise; it was left to his successor, Harry S. Truman, to fully desegregate the armed forces.

Executive Order 9066

Following the outbreak of the Pacific War, the War Department demanded that all enemy nationals and Japanese American citizens be removed from war zones on the West Coast. The question became how to imprison the estimated 120,000 people of Japanese and American citizenship living in California. On February 11, 1942 Roosevelt met with Secretary of War Stimson, who persuaded him to approve an immediate forced evacuation. Roosevelt looked at the secret evidence available to him: the Japanese in the Philippines had collaborated with the Japanese invasion troops; the Japanese in California had been strong supporters of Japan in the war against China. There was evidence of espionage compiled by code-breakers that decrypted messages to Japan from agents in North America and Hawaii before and after Pearl Harbor. These MAGIC cables were kept secret from all but those with the highest clearance, such as Roosevelt, lest the Japanese discover the decryption and change their code. On February 19, 1942 Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066 which ordered Secretary of War, and military commanders to designate military areas "from which any or all persons may be excluded." Roosevelt released the imprisoned Japanese in 1944. On February 1, 1943, when activating the 442nd Regimental Combat Team—a unit composed mostly of American citizens of Japanese descent living in Hawaii, he said, "No loyal citizen of the United States should be denied the democratic right to exercise the responsibilities of his citizenship, regardless of his ancestry. The principle on which this country was founded and by which it has always been governed is that Americanism is a matter of the mind and heart; Americanism is not, and never was, a matter of race or ancestry."

Interior Secretary Ickes lobbied Roosevelt through 1944 to release the Japanese American internees, but Roosevelt did not act until after the November presidential election. A fight for Japanese American civil rights meant a fight with influential Democrats, the Army, and the Hearst press and would have endangered Roosevelt's chances of winning California in 1944. Critics of Roosevelt's actions believe they were motivated in part by racism. In 1925 Roosevelt had written about Japanese immigration: "Californians have properly objected on the sound basic grounds that Japanese immigrants are not capable of assimilation into the American population... Anyone who has traveled in the Far East knows that the mingling of Asiatic blood with European and American blood produces, in nine cases out of ten, the most unfortunate results". In 1944, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the legality of the executive order in the Korematsu v. United States case. The executive order remained in force until December of that year.

The Holocaust and attitudes toward Jews

Persecuted Jews outside the US

During his first term, Roosevelt condemned Hitler's persecution of German Jews. However, in the years leading up to US entry in World War II, the Roosevelt administration "ruled out political protest on behalf of Jews facing mounting persecution in Germany".

Even in 1944, when US public opinion was strongly in favor of admitting an unlimited number of Jewish refugees, Roosevelt prevented even the existing immigration quotas from being filled by Jews. Roosevelt also undermined plans to resettle Jewish refugees in the Dominican Republic and U.S. Virgin Islands, viewing these countries as too close to the US.

In practice very few Jewish refugees came to the U.S.—only 22,000 German refugees were admitted in 1940, not all of them Jewish. The State Department official in charge of refugee issues, Breckinridge Long, insisted on following the highly restrictive immigration laws to the letter. As one example, in 1939, the State Department under Roosevelt did not allow a boat of Jews fleeing from the Nazis into the United States. When the passenger ship St. Louis approached the coast of Florida with nearly a thousand German Jews fleeing persecution by Hitler, Roosevelt did not respond to telegrams from passengers requesting asylum, and the State Department refused entry to the ship. Forced to return to Antwerp, many of the passengers eventually died in concentration camps.

After the Allied conquest of North Africa in 1942, Roosevelt chose to retain the antisemitic Vichy leadership in power there, with some Jews remaining held in concentration camps, and discriminatory laws against Jews remaining in effect. In private Roosevelt argued that Jews did not need the right to vote since no elections were expected to be held soon, and that Jewish participation in the professions should be limited via a quota system. Only after an outcry from Jewish organizations in the US did Roosevelt change its policy regarding North African Jews, with anti-Jewish laws remaining in effect for 10 months after the US conquest.

Attitudes to Jews in the US
Some of his closest political associates, such as Felix Frankfurter, Bernard Baruch and Samuel I. Rosenman, were Jewish. He appointed Henry Morgenthau Jr. as the first Jewish Secretary of the Treasury and appointed Frankfurter to the Supreme Court. Historian Doris Kearns Goodwin cites statistics showing that FDR's high level executive appointments favored Jews (15% of his top appointments at a time when Jews represented 3% of the U.S. population) which subjected Roosevelt to frequent criticism. The August, 1936 edition of "The White Knight" published an article referring to the New Deal as the "Jew Deal." Pamphlets appeared such as "What Every Congressman Should Know" in 1940 (featuring a sketch of the Capitol building with a Star of David atop its dome) that proclaimed that the Jews were in control of the American government. Financier and FDR confidant Bernard Baruch was called the "Unofficial President" in the anti-Semitic literature of the time. The periodical Liberation, for example, accused FDR of loading his government with Jews.

At the same time, Roosevelt expressed racist attitudes towards Jews, both in public and private. As a Harvard administrator in 1923, he helped institute a quota for Jewish students. According to historian Rafael Medoff, "Roosevelt's unflattering statements about Jews consistently reflected one of several interrelated notions: that it was undesirable to have too many Jews in any single profession, institution, or geographic locale; that America was by nature, and should remain, an overwhelmingly white, Protestant country; and that Jews on the whole possessed certain innate and distasteful characteristics." Medoff also noted in a 2016 article for the Jewish Lecter that as a child, Roosevelt's grandson Curtis would often hear his grandfather telling anti-Semitic stories in the White House, with the Jewish characters being Lower East Side people with heavy accents.

References

History of civil rights in the United States
Civil rights

Franklin D. Roosevelt and civil rights


Wollongong ( ; Dharawal: Woolyungah), colloquially referred to as The Gong, is a city located in the Illawarra region of New South Wales, Australia. The name is believed to originate from the Dharawal language, meaning either 'five islands/clouds', 'ground near water' or 'sound of the sea'. Wollongong lies on the narrow coastal strip between the Illawarra Escarpment and the Pacific Ocean, 85 kilometres (53 miles) south of central Sydney. Wollongong had an estimated urban population of 302,739 at June 2018, making it the third-largest city in New South Wales after Sydney and Newcastle and the tenth-largest city in Australia by population. The city's current Lord Mayor is Gordon Bradbery AM who was elected in 2021.

The Wollongong area extends from Helensburgh in the north to Windang and Yallah in the south. Geologically, the city is located in the south-eastern part of the Sydney basin, which extends from Newcastle to Nowra.

Wollongong is noted for its heavy industry, its port activity and the quality of its physical setting, occupying a narrow coastal plain between an almost continuous chain of surf beaches and the cliffline of the rainforest-covered Illawarra escarpment. It has two cathedrals, churches of many denominations and the Nan Tien Temple. Wollongong has a long history of coal mining and industry. The city attracts many tourists each year and is a regional centre for the South Coast fishing industry. The University of Wollongong has around 38,000 students.

History
The area was originally inhabited by the Dharawal Indigenous Australians. The first Europeans to visit the area were the navigators George Bass and Matthew Flinders, who landed at Lake Illawarra in 1796. The first settlers in the region were cedar cutters in the early nineteenth century, followed by graziers in 1812. Charles Throsby established a stockman's hut in the area in 1815. The first land grants were made in 1816. In 1830, a military barracks was constructed near the harbour. Further settlers arrived and in 1834 a town was planned. On 26 November 1834, the town was first gazetted and George Brown erected the first court house. The main road down the Escarpment through Bulli Pass was built by convict labour in 1835–6, although other passes were built during the 19th century as well, such as O'Briens Road and Rixons Pass. By 1856 Wollongong had a population of 864.

In 1858, a court house was built. In 1861, a horse-drawn tramway from Mount Keira to the harbour was completed. In 1862 a telegraph line was opened between Wollongong and Bellambi. In 1865 the first gas supply in Wollongong was provided from a gas plant in Corrimal Street. In 1868 the extensions to the harbour were opened by Lady Belmore and named Belmore Basin. Patrick Lahiff established a coke works at Wollongong Harbour in the 1870s. He erected two beehive coke ovens between the north eastern end of the basin and Pulpit Rock. The ovens were demolished in 1892. The remains of the coke ovens were uncovered and recovered and are now preserved beneath the hill, with a plaque explaining their history.

In 1871 the old lighthouse was completed. Nevertheless, in 1881 a British clipper, , ran ashore off the mouth of Towradgi Creek. Her cargo included 24,000 bottles of Hennessy Cognac. Local police and NSW Customs recovered at least 5,000 bottles, but others were looted by members of the public.

The surviving part of the Queen of Nations wreck is only about  from the shore, in water only  deep. From time to time, a violent storm uncovers part of the wreck. After one such storm in 1991, looting resumed, including of the Cognac. The Commonwealth Government quickly issued an order protecting the wreck under the then Historic Shipwrecks Act 1976. Since 2018 the Underwater Cultural Heritage Act 2018 has automatically protected the wreck and its contents, as they are more than 75 years old.In 1880 steam locomotives were introduced to haul coal from Mount Keira mine to the harbour. Gas street lighting was introduced in 1883. In 1885 a new court house was erected in Market Street. Like many Australian court houses, it was designed in a Classical Revival style considered appropriate for public buildings. It is now listed on the Register of the National Estate. In 1886 the first town hall was erected. The Illawarra Railway to Wollongong was completed in 1887, and now continues as far south as the town of Bomaderry on the Shoalhaven River. The navigator George Bass first documented the Illawarra coal deposits in 1797. There have been many coalmines in the district. Australia's worst coal mining disaster occurred in 1902, at the Mount Kembla mine when an explosion killed 94 men and boys, the youngest aged 14, the oldest 69. Two other men died attempting to rescue survivors. Survivors were treated at the "A. M. (Albert Memorial) Hospital", which opened in 1864 and closed when the Wollongong Hospital opened in 1907 on Garden Hill. In 1916 the Wollongong High School was opened.

Heavy industry was attracted to the region by the ready availability of coal. In 1928, Hoskins, later Australian Iron & Steel, started a steelworks at Port Kembla, a few kilometres south of Wollongong. The former Broken Hill Proprietary Company (now BHP after merging with Billiton plc) acquired AI&S in 1935, but has since spun-out their steel division as a separate company, now known as BlueScope. The steelworks has grown to become a world-class flat rolled steel producer, operating as a fully integrated steel plant with a production of around 5 million tonnes per year. Other industries to have set up in the massive Port Kembla industrial complex—the largest single concentration of heavy industry in Australia—include a fertiliser plant, an electrolytic copper smelter, a locomotive workshop, a coal export shipping terminal, a grain export shipping terminal and an industrial gases manufacturing plant.

In 1936, the new Wollongong Lighthouse was finished on Flagstaff Point. In 1942 Wollongong was proclaimed a City. In 1947 City of Greater Wollongong was formed. In 1954 the population of Wollongong was 90,852. In 1956 new Wollongong City Council Chambers were opened. In 1961 the Wollongong University College was established. In 1963, the Wollongong Teachers College was established. In 1965 the Westfield shopping centre at Figtree opened.

In 1985, the railway line was electrified to Wollongong, and in 1993 to Dapto. In 1986 the Wollongong Mall was completed. For a short while, trams (trackless trains) were used in the mall, though this ceased due to dangers involved. The mall was re-opened to traffic after the initial test but re-zoned a pedestrian area after and has remained one since.

In 1987 the council chambers and library building were completed, replacing the old council building at the present art gallery site. The Crown Gateway Shopping Centre was completed. Wollongong Mall was opened. In 1988, the current council administration building was completed, as well as the Illawarra Performing Arts Centre (IPAC), across the road on Burelli Street. IPAC was officially opened by Prince Charles and Princess Diana in 1988.  A sculpture recognizing Lawrence Hargrave was placed via helicopter on the eastern foothills of Mount Keira. In 1998 the 6000 seat Wollongong Entertainment Centre was opened.

In 1999, the Gateway and Crown Central mall buildings were unified as Wollongong Central and a pedestrian walkway/café was built connecting the buildings in an above ground bridge. In 2000, as part of the Sydney Olympics, the Olympic torch was carried through Wollongong as part of its journey. In 2001, the population of Wollongong reached 181,612 people. In 2004 the Wollongong City Gallery celebrated its 25th anniversary. In 2005 Qantas established a daily air service from Wollongong to Melbourne that lasted till 2008.

In 2006/2007, the library was renovated, including new facilities, as part of the tenth anniversary of the library's current site. Also at this time the beachfront was renovated with a new lookout and walkway upgrade. In June 2007, erosion was caused via storms to the beaches, the worst in 30 years.

Despite the decline of traditional manufacturing and blue-collar industries due to the abandonment of protectionist economic policies in the 1980s, many of these industrial installations still exist. The city's economy is, however, on the rebound, thanks to diversification of economic activity including higher education, the fine arts, tourism, residential construction and eco-friendly electricity generation; however, the city's economy still relies primarily on heavy industry, and will continue to in the near future.

Various meanings are given for the Aboriginal word ' Wollongong' including 'seas of the South', ' great feast of fish' , 'hard ground near water', 'song of the sea' ' sound of the waves' 'many snakes' and ' five islands'.

Heritage listings

Wollongong has a number of heritage-listed sites, including:
Church Street: St Michael's Cathedral
 Cliff Road: North Beach Precinct
 Cliff Road and Endeavour Drive: Wollongong Harbour Precinct
 87 Crown Street: 87 Crown Street
 91 Crown Street: Old Wollongong East Post Office
 Darling Street: Elouera House
 Illawarra railway: Wollongong railway station
 197 Keira Street: Regent Theatre
 11 Market Street: Old Wollongong Telegraph and Post Office
 31–33 Smith Street: Little Milton

Geography

The city of Wollongong has a distinct geography. It lies on a narrow coastal plain flanked by the Tasman Sea to the east and a steep sandstone precipice known as the Illawarra Escarpment to the west. The coastal plain is widest in the south and narrowest in the north, with the city centre located about midway. South of the city centre but within the urban area is Lake Illawarra, a large lagoon. Although Wollongong sits on the immediate coast, it lies on the same longitude as Greater Western Sydney.
The escarpment ranges between 150 and 750 metres (490–2,460 ft) above sea level, with locally famous mountains such as Mount Keira (464m), Mount Kembla (534m), Broker's Nose (440m) and Mount Murray (768m) to the south. It contains strata of coal measures, and the adit entrances to many coal mines have been established along the slopes of the escarpment throughout Wollongong. Suburbia encroaches on the escarpment's lower slopes in some areas, but the majority remains in a relatively natural state forested with dry sclerophyll and pockets of temperate rainforest. The escarpment is largely protected by a State Conservation Area and local scenic protection zoning, and provides the visual backdrop to the city.In the north the escarpment meets the coastline, and north of this the coastal road Lawrence Hargrave Drive hugs the cliff line. The unstable geology of the escarpment resulted in rockfalls, forcing the closure of the road. Subsequently, part of Lawrence Hargrave Drive was replaced in 2005 by the Sea Cliff Bridge just off the coast, crossing the submerged rock shelf. The bridge carries both vehicular and pedestrian traffic. The Illawarra railway line must go through several tunnels to reach the Sydney metropolitan area. The Southern Freeway and Princes Highway provide alternative inland routes, descending the escarpment further south at Bulli Pass or at Mount Ousley, entering just north of Wollongong's city centre.

To the south the plain reaches its maximum extent around Albion Park where it incorporates a large coastal saltwater lagoon called Lake Illawarra, separated from the Pacific Ocean by a long sandy spit.

The coastal strip consists of highly fertile alluvium, which made Wollongong so attractive to agriculturists in the nineteenth century. It contains many hills including the foothills of the escarpment's lower slopes, and while these generally do not exceed one hundred metres in height they give much of the city an undulating character. The coastal strip is traversed by several short but flood-prone and fast-flowing streams and creeks such as Fairy Creek (Para Creek), Cabbage Tree Creek, Allans Creek, Nostaw Ravine, Jimbob Creek, Mullet Creek and Macquarie Rivulet.

The coastline consists of many beaches characterised by fine pale gold-coloured sands; however, these beaches are sometimes interrupted by prominent and rocky headlands, such as Tego Rock, jutting into the sea. In places these headlands have been excavated or extended to create artificial harbours at Wollongong, Port Kembla, Shellharbour and Kiama. Just off the coast south of Wollongong centre, near Port Kembla, lies a group of five islands known collectively as The Five Islands. The islands are a wildlife refuge.

Inner city

The inner city area includes the suburbs of Wollongong and North Wollongong, extending from Fairy Creek in the north, west to include the Wollongong Hospital, and south to the Greenhouse Park. At the , the suburb of Wollongong had a population of 18,442.

The CBD is a major commercial hub containing many department stores and specialty shops, offices, and entertainment venues. It is centred on the Crown Street Mall and Wollongong Central, and approximates the area bounded by Market, Corrimal, and Burelli streets and the railway line. Surrounding the CBD lies a mixture of parks, reserves, light commercial property, houses and multi-story residential units. Multi-story housing is evident particularly on Smith's Hill, north-east of the CBD, reflecting the popularity of combining inner-city living, coastal views and a beachside lifestyle.

To the east of the city lies Flagstaff Point, a rocky headland with eroded low cliffs topped by a grassy hill. The northern side of the point was excavated by convict labour to form Belmore Basin. This was later extended with the northern breakwater to create Wollongong Harbour. The area is the site of a historic colonial fort, several restored cannons and two lighthouses, a feature peculiar to the east coast of Australia. The older Wollongong Breakwater Lighthouse located at the harbour entrance was made of wrought iron plates in 1871 and has become an icon of the city. The newer Wollongong Head Lighthouse was constructed in 1936 atop the Flagstaff Hill and is still used in the early 21st century. Belmore Basin houses the commercial fishing fleet and Fisherman's Co-op, while the main harbour shelters private vessels.

The main beaches of central Wollongong are North Wollongong (or simply North) Beach, extending from the harbour up to the Fairy lagoon and Puckeys Estate Reserve, and Wollongong City Beach, extending south from Flagstaff Point and into Coniston Beach.

Climate
Wollongong has an oceanic climate (Köppen: Cfb), but with humid subtropical (Cfa) influences as its warmest month mean of
is just below the subtropical isotherm of . The highest recorded temperature is 44.1 °C on 1 January 2006, and the lowest 0.8 °C on 27 July 1986. Annually, Wollongong receives 107.4 clear days.

Rainfall is spread through the months but has a bias to the first half of the year. It is often associated with orographic lift caused by the escarpment and its exposed location on the Tasman Sea, which makes it more prone to moist easterlies. A significant flood event occurred on 18 August 1998 when Wollongong recorded 316 mm of rainfall (the nearby suburb of Mt Ousley recorded in excess of 445 mm), mostly falling in a 3-hour period. Wollongong also experiences thunderstorms during the warmer months bringing lightning, heavy rain and occasionally hail.

July and August are known as the windy months, with westerly gales that can gust at over 100 km/h. These are generally dry foehn winds from the Great Dividing Range, which are common at this time of the year in southeast Australia on the leeward side of the Ranges.

Demographics
The Wollongong metropolitan area includes the suburbs, outlying towns and rural localities stretching from Helensburgh in the north to Kiama in the south. According to the 2021 census, it had a population of 305,691 people.
 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people made up 3.6% of the population.
 76.3% of people were born in Australia. The next most common countries of birth were England 3.9%, North Macedonia 1.3%, New Zealand 1.1%, Italy 0.9% and India 0.9%.
 81.7% of people spoke only English at home. Other languages spoken at home included Macedonian 2.0%, Italian 1.1%, Arabic 1.1% , Mandarin 0.8%, and Spanish 0.8%.
 The most common responses for religion were No Religion 38.0%, Catholic 23.3% and Anglican 13.6%.
 5.1% of employed people worked in Hospitals (except Psychiatric Hospitals). Other major industries of employment included Other Social Assistance Services 3.1%, Aged Care Residential Services 2.8%, Supermarket and Grocery Stores 2.6% and Takeaway Food Services 2.5%.

It is the third largest city in New South Wales and the tenth largest in Australia. Using 2006 ABS geography, around 89% of the statistical district's population reside in the built-up urban centre extending from Clifton to Shell Cove.
Wollongong is continuing to grow with a population growth of 3.1% for the period 2001 to 2006, although the supply of new residential land is limited by the geography particularly in the northern suburbs. The west Dapto area is a major centre of future growth with plans for 19,000 new dwellings and 50,000 people within 40 years. New residential areas are also being developed further south around the Albion Park, Shell Cove and Kiama areas.

Wollongong has a distinctly multicultural population. Many migrants were attracted to the area by the job opportunities at the Port Kembla steelworks in the post-war period, and settled in surrounding suburbs such as Cringila, Warrawong and Coniston. By 1966 about 60% of the wage earners at the Australian Iron and Steel steelworks were born overseas coming from over 100 countries. These included British, Irish, Macedonians, Spaniards, Portuguese, Greeks, Italians, Arabs, Russians, Bosnians, Croatians, Serbians, Germans, Turks, Chileans and Brazilians. With the end of the White Australia policy these were followed by Indo-Chinese refugees in the 1970s, Indians, Filipinos, Chinese, Japanese, Malaysians, Singaporeans, Koreans and Pacific Islanders in the 1980s and 1990s. The University of Wollongong continues to attract students and staff from all over the world, with around 5,000 overseas student enrolments.

Around 20,000 people commute daily to jobs in Sydney by road and rail, making it one of the busiest commuter corridors in Australia.

Education

Tertiary and further education

There are two campuses of the Illawarra Institute of TAFE. The Wollongong Campus is the network's largest campus, and it offers a variety of courses.

Wollongong has one university, the University of Wollongong, which was formerly part of the University of New South Wales. The University was awarded the "Australian University of the Year" in two consecutive years (1999–2000, 2000–2001) by the Good Universities Guide, and is internationally recognised. It has two main campuses: the primary campus on Northfields Avenue, and the Innovation Campus on Squires Way. The University's Sydney Business School also has a secondary campus in Sydney.

Schools
Wollongong has a number of primary and high schools, including public, denominational and independent.

Media
Wollongong has one daily newspaper, The Illawarra Mercury published and issued Monday to Saturday by Australian Community Media (ACM). Additionally, ACM publishes several free community newspapers including the Advertiser incorporating Lake Times and Kiama Independent.

Wollongong and the Illawarra region are serviced by three commercial television networks – WIN Television, the Seven Network and Southern Cross 10. The Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) and the Special Broadcasting Service (SBS) also broadcast television services to Wollongong. In addition to these channels, ten new channels broadcasting in are also available in Wollongong and the greater Illawarra region. These channels include ABC HD, ABC Kids, ABC TV Plus, ABC Me, ABC News, 7HD, 7two, 7mate, 7flix, 7Bravo, 9HD, 9Go!, 9Gem, 9Life, 10 HD, 10 Bold, 10 Peach and SBS Viceland. In some areas it is also possible to pick up Sydney channels. Subscription Television service Foxtel (formerly Austar) is also available via satellite.

Of the three main commercial networks:
WIN Television airs a half-hour local WIN News each weeknight at 5:30pm, produced and broadcast from the network's headquarters in the city.
Southern Cross 10 airs short news & weather updates of 10 News First throughout the day from Hobart.
The Seven Network airs short local news and weather updates throughout the day, produced and broadcast from its Canberra studios.

The region receives five ABC radio services – ABC Illawarra 97.3FM, Triple J 98.9, and Radio National 1431 AM, ABC Classic FM 95.7 and Newsradio 90.9FM. There are two commercial radio stations i98FM 98.1 and WAVE FM 96.5 – formerly 2WL, and two community radio stations Vox FM 106.9 and Christian broadcaster 94.1 FM.

On the 17th of November 2021 the board game Monopoly launched a 'Wollongong' Edition. It showcases a number of Wollongong attractions including: Nan Tien Temple, Mount Keira, and the Sea Cliff Bridge.

Transport

Road

The main road connecting Wollongong is the M1 Princes Motorway (formerly the F6). The motorway, part of National Route 1, descends the escarpment via Mount Ousley Road to enter the city near the University of Wollongong and exits at its southern fringe. A second freeway, Memorial Drive (formerly the Northern Distributor), continues northward from the university to connect Wollongong's northern suburbs, Bulli Pass and the scenic Lawrence Hargrave Drive. The Illawarra Highway connects Wollongong's southern suburbs to the Southern Highlands via Macquarie Pass.

Rail

 is served by the Illawarra railway line. Passenger rail services on this line connect the centres of Nowra and Kiama to the south and Sydney to the north. A branch line connects suburbs between the CBD and Port Kembla. A passenger rail service connecting Wollongong to the Southern Highlands has since been replaced with a coach service. Wollongong railway station is the city's main train station, and serves Wollongong's CBD.

Freight services connect Sydney markets with Port Kembla and the Manildra Group factory at Bomaderry. The Southern Highlands line is used primarily for freight, providing an important bypass for Sydney's congested rail network.

Bus
Route services in Wollongong are provided by Premier Illawarra and Dion's Bus Service who also provide school/charter services together with some other companies. Wollongong railway station serves as the network's hub. Services connect Wollongong suburbs to Shellharbour, Lake Illawarra and the Royal National Park. There is also a Free Shuttle Bus service that connects the CBD, University and the suburbs of North Wollongong, Fairy Meadow and Gwynneville.

Air

Wollongong is serviced by Shellharbour Airport, also known as Illawarra Regional Airport and Wollongong Airport. The Airport is located in Albion Park Rail, 18km south of Wollongong CBD in the Shellharbour City LGA.

Regular Public Transport (RPT) air services to Melbourne (Essendon) and Brisbane airports were recommenced by Fly Corporate in 2018, following the cancellation of previous services offered by JetGo and QantasLink. Fly Corporate operates 34 seat SAAB 340B turboprop aircraft.

There are multiple air charter businesses including NSW Air, EliteJet and Touchdown Helicopters. The Historical Aircraft Restoration Society (HARS) is also based at the airport.

Port

Wollongong is served by Port Kembla harbour, which is a major export location for coal mined in the southern and western regions of New South Wales. As part of the state governments plan to divert ships containing automobiles, the port has received significant upgrades and infrastructure including a new Maritime Office and many jobs have been created as the need for port logistics grows. Patrick Corporation holds a contract for integrated port services in the harbour and transports goods by road or rail through its parent company Pacific National.

The port has a range of berths for loading coal, grain, shipping containers and other goods. As of 2020, a gas export terminal is also under development.

Port Kembla was identified by the Australian Defence Department in 2023 as the most likely location to homeport the future Australian nuclear-powered submarines, probably active no earlier than the 2030s.

Culture

Arts

Wollongong maintains an active arts scene. In the area of music the city is home to various music and jazz ensembles. The Wollongong Conservatorium of Music provides musical tuition for instruments and voice in classical, jazz and contemporary styles. It is one of the largest regional conservatoriums in Australia and located in the historic Gleniffer Brae Manor House, part of the Wollongong Botanic Gardens.

The local professional theatre company, Merrigong Theatre Company, is located at the Illawarra Performing Arts Centre. Merrigong also manages the city's key civic and community venue, the Wollongong Town Hall, and presents a diverse range of events in the heart of the city. Other local theatre groups include The Arcadians, The Phoenix Theatre and Wollongong Workshop Theatre.

The annual Wollongong Eisteddfod showcases local talent in music, theatre and dance.

The Wollongong Art Gallery houses a significant collection of the art of the Illawarra, contemporary Australian, Aboriginal and Asian art.

The popular 1990s stoner rock band Tumbleweed were formed and based in Wollongong, as are Surf-Rock duo Hockey Dad.

Yours and Owls Festival is an annual music festival that attracts 12,000 people and features the best up and coming Australian and international bands.

Cyrus Villanueva, winner of the seventh season of The X Factor Australia, was born and raised in Wollongong.

Wollongong also hosts Wonderwalls, an annual street art festival featuring local and internationally acclaimed street artists.

Entertainment and nightlife
Entertainment venues include the Crown Street Mall, many restaurants and cafes, the town cinemas and the Illawarra Performing Arts Centre. Adjacent to WIN Stadium, the home ground of the NRL team St. George Illawarra Dragons, is the WIN Entertainment Centre: a multipurpose venue which hosts concerts and sporting events (including Southern Stars, basketball and motocross stunt shows). There are numerous city nightclubs, pubs & registered clubs; Including The Illawarra Master Builders Club, The Grand Hotel (back to its original name, after being called Cooney's for a few years), Mr Crown, Ron De Vu, The Illawarra Hotel, The Harp Hotel, and The North Wollongong Hotel. Most suburbs also have their own hotels, each with individual character.

Recreation

Wollongong has 17 seasonally-patrolled local beaches: Stanwell Park, Coalcliff, Scarborough/Wombarra, Coledale, Austinmer, Thirroul, Sandon Point, Bulli, Woonona, Bellambi, Corrimal, Towradgi, Fairy Meadow, North Wollongong, Wollongong City, Port Kembla and Windang. Surfing, rock fishing, swimming, skimboarding are common activities. The Wollongong to Thirroul Bike Track, a thirteen kilometre Heart Foundation walking/biking pathway which runs northwards adjacent to the Illawarra coastline starting at Wollongong Beach, is frequented by walkers, joggers, skaters and bicycle riders. Bushwalking on nearby Mount Keira and Mount Kembla, and motorbike riding at the Motocross Track on the escarpment west of Wollongong, are also popular activities.

Wollongong has many parks. In the city centre is MacCabe Park, featuring a playground, the local youth centre, a war memorial, community hall, a sculpture called "Nike" and a brick amphitheatre. Lang Park, adjacent to the city beach, has a number of shelters built in the 1950s. These were subject for demolition but were saved by a community vote. Stuart Park, to the coastal north of the city but south of Fairy Lagoon and Puckeys Estate Reserve, is well known as a landing spot for skydivers as well as a place for outdoor recreation and social gatherings. Stuart Park is also distinctive for its Norfolk Island Pines, planted during the North Wollongong tourism boom in the 1920s. J.J.Kelly Park to the south is used by circuses, as well as a protected area of creek leading to the Greenhouse Park north of the Port Kembla Steelworks, containing a revegetated area of once waste and a lookout, as well as the small remnants of Tom Thumb Lagoon, which once stretched north to Swan Street. Beaton Park in Gwynneville is home to Tennis Wollongong and the Leisure Centre with an athletics complex, indoor heated swimming pool, gymnasium and multipurpose sports hall.

Sport
Wollongong is home to two professional sports teams, the St George Illawarra Dragons of the National Rugby League and the Illawarra Hawks of the National Basketball League.

Rugby league

The most popular sport in Wollongong is rugby league. The St George Illawarra Dragons rugby league club represents the city in the National Rugby League (NRL) competition. The club was formed in a merger between the St. George Dragons and the Illawarra Steelers in 1999, and they play half their home games at WIN Stadium in Downtown Wollongong. They won the 2010 NRL Grand Final against the Sydney Roosters.

Prior to the merger the Illawarra Steelers had represented the area in the New South Wales Rugby League premiership and NRL between 1982 and 1998. The Illawarra Steelers continue to represent the Illawarra region in all four NSWRL Junior Representative Competitions: the SG Ball Cup, Harold Matthews Cup, Tarsha Gale Cup, and the Lisa Fiaola Cup.

Rugby League has been played in Wollongong since 1911, and the area has produced at least 41 international players. At the local level league continues to have a strong following with a number of teams playing in the Illawarra Rugby League and Group 7 Rugby League competitions. The Illawarra League features 14 senior clubs north of Lake Illawarra, and 5 of Group 7's clubs are located in the Wollongong urban area around the Shellharbour district.

Basketball
The Illawarra Hawks basketball team play in the National Basketball League and are the only NBL club to have competed in every season since the league's inception in 1979. Home games are played at the WIN Entertainment Centre, nicknamed as "The Sandpit" in the NBL due to its close proximity to the beach. This makes the Hawks the only professional sports team to play all home games in the Illawarra. The Hawks won the 2001 NBL Championship.In addition to the NBL side, local community basketball competitions are run by Basketball Illawarra. Basketball Illawarra's representative side, also called the Illawarra Hawks, compete in the Basketball NSW competition, the Waratah League.

Football
Wollongong Wolves compete in the National Premier Leagues NSW, the second-tier of football in Australia.  In late 2008, the club folded due to debts incurred over the past season, but was rescued financially by community support, and as a community-owned not-for-profit organisation has been successful in competitions. A consortium named Great South Football is preparing the Illawarra's South Coast A-League bid. Scott Chipperfield, a Wollongong native who became a professional football player in Europe, has expressed an interest in being involved in a Wollongong football club playing in the A-League. It is proposed that a new community-based entity would then take on their Football NSW licence. Illawarra Stingrays compete  in the National Premier Leagues Women's, the second tier of Women's football in Australia.

Other sports
The city does not have a senior cricket team representing it, however there are two strong local competitions; Cricket Illawarra and Cricket South Coast. Ireland captain Trent Johnston grew up in Dapto and played for New South Wales before leaving for Ireland. Australian internationals and New South Wales players Brett and Shane Lee were raised in Oak Flats and played for the local cricket club Oak Flat Rats.

The Illawarriors are a rugby union club based in the Illawarra, who contest the Shute Shield NSW club competition. The club play some of their home games at WIN Stadium. Local rugby union is played in the Illawarra Rugby Union.

The first recorded match of water polo in Wollongong came in 1894, in a men's match between the Wollongong and Kiama Swim Clubs at Brighton Beach. The Kiama Swim Club prevailed, winning 3-0. Water polo is currently played at UOW Pool through the Illawarra Water Polo Club. Each year, Illawarra also compete at the NSW Country Club Championships, whereby the Illawarra U14's boys won in 2021.

The Illawarra Cycling Club holds road cycle races almost every week of the year. During the summer, velodrome racing is also promoted at the Unanderra Velodrome on the Princes Highway. A recent focus within the club has seen a shift to encompass a stronger emphasis on youth development programs alongside its already strong commitment to competitive under 19's, 23's and adult road racing. The club is represented at a state and national level regularly and has had several riders compete at international levels.

The Gong Scorpions are the local Floorball team from the Wollongong area. The Club plays socially at the Wollongong University and has recently been re-established in order to compete in the NSW Elite Series.

Baseball has been played in the region with structured competitions conducted since 1938. The Illawarra District Baseball Association was the governing body from this year until 1991 when the Illawarra Baseball League was created.
The Illawarra Junior Baseball League was inaugurated in 1984 to accommodate a growing number of juniors that peaked at around 950 players in 1995.
Eight regional clubs from four Local Government Areas play in the I B L.
A regional club, the Illawarra Flame Baseball Club, fielded teams in four grades in the New South Wales Baseball League Sydney Major League from 1994 to 2007. The first grade team made the Grand Final in their inaugural season. The Club won a total of four premierships while participating.
The IFBC played their inaugural games against the All Kawasaki Baseball Club in August 1994 the games being the first sporting exchange between the Sister Cities, Wollongong and Kawasaki.

The Wollongong Whales compete against Bondi Icebergs Winter Swimming Club, South Maroubra Dolphins Winter Swimming Club, Cronulla Polar Bears Winter Swimming Club, Maroubra Seals Winter Swimming Club, Coolangatta Surf Life Saving Club, Clovelly Eskimos Winter Swimming Club, Bronte Splashers, Coogee Penguins Winter Swimming Club and Cottesloe Crabs in the Winter Swimming Association of Australia Championships.

Other popular sports in the Illawarra include golf, rock climbing, surfing, cup stacking, triathlon, ultimate frisbee and mountain biking.

In the book Quidditch Through the Ages by J. K. Rowling, the Wollongong Warriors are listed as one of Australia's quidditch teams. They have a rivalry with the Thundelarra Thunderers, and are the inventors of the Wollongong Shimmy, a high-speed zig-zag move designed to confuse and distract opposing Chasers. Wollongong Warriors is now a real club in Australian Quidditch Association, a Muggle quidditch league.

Wollongong hosted the UCI Road World Championships in 2022.

AFL South Coast is a park football competition in the region.

Attractions

In addition to numerous swimming, skate spots and surfing beaches, major visitor attractions to Wollongong City include:

 Five Islands Brewery
 Wollongong Botanic Gardens
 Cockatoo Run scenic train ride from Wollongong to Robertson
 Fairy Meadow Skatepark
 Cycling to Sandon Point from North Wollongong
 Wollongong Harbour (Belmore Basin), Wollongong Breakwater Lighthouse, Wollongong Head Lighthouse and surrounding foreshores
 Illawarra Light Railway Museum, with light and miniature train rides
 Illawarra Museum
 iPac Theatre
 Wollongong Town Hall
 Wollongong Crown Street Mall
 Wollongong City Library
 Wollongong Art Gallery
 Bulli Tops (Sublime Point and Cliffhanger Restaurant), Mount Keira, Port Kembla (Illowra Battery), Illawarra Fly Tree Top Walk,
 Nan Tien Temple
 Hill 60 Port Kembla
 Fisherman's Beach
 Science Centre and Planetarium
 WIN Stadium
 WIN Entertainment Centre
 Wodi Wodi Track

Sister and friendship cities
Wollongong has sister city and friendship city arrangements with:

 Kawasaki, Japan, formally established 1988
 Ohrid, North Macedonia, established 1981, lapsed, formally re-established 1999
 Longyan, People's Republic of China (friendship city), formally established 2001

Notable people

See also

 List of Wollongong suburbs
 Norman Gunston and Aunty Jack Sings Wollongong
 HMAS Wollongong
 Newcastle
 Geelong

References

External links

 Wollongong City Council
 "Illawarra From Above" – Satellite and Aerial Video
 Tourism Wollongong
 Wollongong – Visit NSW
 Wollongong Advertiser incorporating Lake Times
 Kiama Independent
 Merrigong Theatre Company
 Wollongong Town Hall
 Wollongong TV Guide – All channels currently broadcasting in the Wollongong and surrounding areas

City of Wollongong
1834 establishments in Australia
Coastal cities in Australia
Populated places established in 1834
Port cities in New South Wales

Wollongong


Charles Edward Fairburn (5 September 1887 – 12 October 1945) was an English electrical engineer whose work mainly concerned rail transport.

Born in Bradford in 1887, and educated at Brasenose College, Oxford, his career included railway electrification work undertaken in the 1910s at the Siemens Brothers Dynamo Works Ltd., then similar work at English Electric in the 1920s where he also was involved in electric traction development work. In 1934 he joined  the London, Midland and Scottish Railway where he was responsible for the introduction of new classes of diesel-electric shunting locomotives - he became Chief Mechanical Engineer of the company in the 1940s, but died in 1945 aged 58.

Biography
Charles Edward Fairburn was born on 5 September 1887 in Bradford. After an education at Bradford Grammar School he won a scholarship to Brasenose College, Oxford University where he studied mathematics and engineering, and obtained a first class degree. After college he served two years under the tutelage of Henry Fowler at the Derby Works of the Midland Railway. He studied technical drawing at Derby, and metallurgy at Sheffield, obtaining an MA in 1912.

Fairburn's career then began in 1912 at the Siemens Brothers dynamo works (Siemens Brothers Dynamo Works Ltd.) in Stafford, where he worked in the railway engineering department; he was an assistant engineer on the Shildon-Newport electrification of the North Eastern Railway (see Railway electrification in Great Britain), being responsible for the design of overhead line electrification equipment and introduction of electric locomotives.

In 1914 he married Eleanor Cadman of Bradford.

During World War I Fairburn served in the Royal Flying Corps in an experimental squadron, where he was involved in the development of dive bomber aircraft using the Sopwith Camel, also developing night, formation and cloud flying, and organising training in those subjects. In 1919 he joined English Electric and developed their railway electrification department; by 1931 he had risen to chief engineer of the traction department, having been involved in electrification schemes on the Southern Railway, the New Zealand Government Railways, the Great Indian Peninsula Railway, the London Post Office Railway, and the Danske Statsbaner. He collaborated with Kálmán Kandó of the Ganz Works in Hungary.

In 1934 Fairburn joined the London, Midland and Scottish Railway (LMS) as Chief Electrical Engineer. In 1938 he was appointed Deputy Chief Mechanical Engineer (CME) under William Stanier. He was responsible for the introduction of diesel-electric shunters onto the LMS, creating types that would form the basis of over 1400 shunters used by British Railways.

Fairburn was made Acting CME of the LMS when Stanier was called away on war work in 1942 at the Ministry of Production and became CME in 1944, on Stanier's retirement.

In 1945 he introduced the LMS Fairburn 2-6-4T, a modified version of the LMS Stanier 2-6-4T with a shortened wheelbase, and made proposals for the first mainline diesel locomotives which were carried out under his successor H.G. Ivatt. (see also LMS 10000)

Fairburn died of a heart attack aged 58 on 12 October 1945. He was survived by his wife, Eleanor, with whom he had had two children.

Works

References

Sources

Further reading

External links

1887 births
1945 deaths
Royal Flying Corps officers
Royal Air Force personnel of World War I
English electrical engineers
English railway mechanical engineers
Locomotive builders and designers
London, Midland and Scottish Railway people
People educated at Bradford Grammar School
Alumni of Brasenose College, Oxford

Charles Fairburn


Murray Lewis Byrne  (29 August 1928 – 7 November 2012) was an Australian politician from the Liberal Party who served as a member of the Victorian Legislative Council for Ballarat Province from 21 June 1958 to 28 April 1976.

He served as Victoria's Minister for Public Works from June 1970 to August 1972, and as Minister for State Development and Decentralisation, Tourism and Immigration from August 1972 to March 1976.

Born in Ballarat, Victoria, Byrne died in Ballarat on 7 November 2012 at the age of 84. He and his wife Adele had eight children.

References

1928 births
2012 deaths
Members of the Victorian Legislative Council
Liberal Party of Australia members of the Parliament of Victoria
Australian Companions of the Order of St Michael and St George
20th-century Australian lawyers
Ministers for Public Works (Victoria)

Murray Byrne


Margaretha van Valckenburch (20 August 1565 – 16 July 1650) was a Dutch shipowner. She was the only woman to have been a stockholder or bewindhebbers of the Dutch East India Company (VOC).

Margaretha van Valckenburch was born to the rich silk merchant Jan van Valckenburch (c. 1538–1603) and Elisabeth van Vaerleer (died 1623) and married the rich trader Marcus de Vogelaer (1566?-1610) in 1587. Upon the death of her spouse in 1610, she was left with ten minor children to support. She inherited a fortune from both her father and her spouse and managed one of the biggest trading companies in the Netherlands, sending her ships to trade in Russia and the Republic of Venice. She inherited the stocks of her spouse in the VOC, but increased the investment in the company.

References
Stefan Kras, Valckenburch, Margaretha van, in: Digitaal Vrouwenlexicon van Nederland. URL: http://resources.huygens.knaw.nl/vrouwenlexicon/lemmata/data/Valkenburch [14/12/2015]

1565 births
1650 deaths
17th-century Dutch businesswomen
17th-century Dutch businesspeople
Dutch East India Company people

Margaretha van Valckenburch


James Clerk Maxwell (born 13 June 1831 in Edinburgh – died 5 November 1879) was a Scottish mathematician, physicist and discoverer of Maxwell's equations.

Early life
Maxwell grew up in a rich religious family. In 1845, when he was only 14, he wrote a paper describing a way of drawing mathematical curves with a piece of string. In 1847 he started studying mathematics at the University of Edinburgh. In 1850 Maxwell changed to Peterhouse and then Trinity College at the University of Cambridge. He won prizes from the university for his work and was given his degree in 1854. From 1855 to 1872 he did research on colour blindness.

Works
In 1856 Maxwell was made a professor of 'Natural Philosophy' (which is what science was called then) at Marischal College, Aberdeen. He worked there until the two colleges in Aberdeen joined together in 1860 and he lost his job. He then became a professor at King's College London. In 1861 he was elected to the Royal Society.

In 1871, he became the first Cavendish Professor of Physics at Cambridge. He studied many things, but is known best for his mathematical work on electromagnetism and on the behaviour of gases. He used the experiments of Michael Faraday  to see how magnetism and electricity were connected.  This helped him to make his  equations that allowed scientists to understand light and radio waves.

He lived at Glenlair House, his family estate near the village of Parton, Castle Douglas in Kirkcudbrightshire. Maxwell died in 1879 from cancer, and is buried in the graveyard at Parton Church.

Publications

 Maxwell, James Clerk, "On the Description of Oval Curves, and those having a plurality of Focus (geometry)|Foci". Proceedings of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Vol. ii. 1846.
 Maxwell, James Clerk, "Illustrations of the Dynamical Theory of Gases". 1860.
 Maxwell, James Clerk, "On Physical Lines of Force". 1861.
 Maxwell, James Clerk, "A Dynamical Theory of the Electromagnetic Field". 1865.
 Maxwell, James Clerk, "On Governors ".From the Proceedings of the Royal Society, No.100. 1868.
 Maxwell, James Clerk, "Theory of Heat". 1871.
 Maxwell, James Clerk, "A Treatise on Electricity and Magnetism". Clarendon Press, Oxford. 1873.
 Maxwell, James Clerk, "Molecules ". Nature, September, 1873.
 Maxwell, James Clerk, "Matter and Motion", 1876.
 Maxwell, James Clerk, "On the Results of Bernoulli's Theory of Gases as Applied to their Internal Friction, their Diffusion, and their Conductivity for Heat".
 Maxwell, James Clerk, "Ether", Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition (1875–89).

1831 births
1879 deaths
Scientists from Edinburgh
Scottish mathematicians
British theoretical physicists
Scottish physicists

James Clerk Maxwell