In accordance with the category requirements, the coordinates are located at the Charlotte City Hall on S Davidson St at E 4th Street in downtown Charlotte.
The waymarked historical marker is located at Thomas Polk Park, on the southwest corner of Independence Square, at the corner of N Tryon and E Trade Street in downtown Charlotte. Coords for this point are N 35 13.6338 W -80 50.6144
The waymarked historical marker is located on the Liberty Walk inside of the Thomas Polk park. It is incised in a panel around the waterfall. The marker reads as follows:
"The earliest known inhabitants of this part of the Piedmont for the Catawba Indians. Beginning in the 1750s, Scotch-Irish Presbyterians and German Lutherans followed established paths into the area. Charlotte and Mecklenburg County were named to honor the German-born wife of British King George III."
The Person:
"Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz (Sophia Charlotte; 19 May 1744 – 17 November 1818) was by marriage to King George III the Queen of Great Britain and Ireland from her wedding in 1761 until the union of the two kingdoms in 1801, after which she was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland until her death in 1818. She was also the Electress of Hanover in the Holy Roman Empire until the promotion of her husband to King of Hanover on 12 October 1814, after which she was also queen consort of Hanover.
Queen Charlotte was a patroness of the arts and an amateur botanist, who helped expand Kew Gardens. George III and Charlotte had 15 children, 13 of whom survived to adulthood. She was distressed by her husband's bouts of physical illness and insanity, which became permanent in later life and resulted in their eldest son's appointment as Prince Regent in 1811.
Legacy
Places named after her include . . . Charlotte, North Carolina; Mecklenburg County, North Carolina; Mecklenburg County, Virginia; . . . "
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The Place:
"Charlotte is the most populous city in the U.S. state of North Carolina. It is the county seat of Mecklenburg County. In 2016, the U.S. Census Bureau estimated the population was 842,051, making it the 17th-most populous city in the United States. The Charlotte metropolitan area ranks 22nd-largest in the U.S., and had a 2016 population of 2,474,314. . . . Residents are referred to as "Charlotteans".
Charlotte is home to the corporate headquarters of Bank of America and the east coast operations of Wells Fargo, which along with other financial institutions made it the second-largest banking center in the United States from 1995 to 2017 and the third-largest from 2017 to present. Among Charlotte's many notable attractions, some of the most popular include the Carolina Panthers of the National Football League (NFL), the Charlotte Hornets of the National Basketball Association (NBA), the Charlotte Independence of the United Soccer League (USL), the Charlotte Hounds of Major League Lacrosse, two NASCAR Cup Series races and the NASCAR All-Star Race, the Wells Fargo Championship, the NASCAR Hall of Fame, the Charlotte Ballet, Carowinds amusement park, and the U.S. National Whitewater Center. . . .
History
The Catawba Native Americans were the first to settle Mecklenburg County (in the Charlotte area) and were first recorded in European records around 1567. . . . The City of Charlotte as we know it, had it origins with the heavy influx of Scotch-Irish / Scots-Irish Presbyterians, or Ulster-Scot settlers, who dominated the culture of the Southern Piedmont Region and is the principle founding European population. The Germans settled in much smaller numbers but contributed greatly to the early foundations of the region. The Flag of Charlotte is the Saint Andrews Flag of Scotland or Saltire with a City Crest.
Mecklenburg County was initially part of Bath County (1696 to 1729) of New Hanover Precinct, which became New Hanover County in 1729. The western portion of New Hanover split into Bladen County in 1734, its western portion splitting into Anson County in 1750. Mecklenburg County formed from Anson County in 1762. Further apportionment was made in 1792, with Cabarrus County formed from Mecklenburg, and in 1842, with Union County formed from Mecklenburg's southeastern portion and from a western portion of Anson County. These areas were all part of one of the original six judicial/military districts of North Carolina known as the Salisbury District.
The area that is now Charlotte was settled by people of European descent around 1755, when Thomas Spratt and his family settled near what is now the Elizabeth neighborhood. Thomas Polk (granduncle of U.S. President James K. Polk), who later married Thomas Spratt's daughter, built his house by the intersection of two Native American trading paths between the Yadkin and Catawba rivers. One path ran north–south and was part of the Great Wagon Road; the second path ran east–west along what is now Trade Street.
Nicknamed the Queen City, like its county a few years earlier, Charlotte was named in honor of German princess Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, who had become the Queen Consort of Great Britain and Ireland in 1761, just seven years before the town's incorporation. . . .
Within decades of Polk's settling, the area grew to become "Charlotte Town", incorporating in 1768. The crossroads, perched atop the Piedmont landscape, became the heart of Uptown Charlotte. . . .
Local leaders came together in 1775 and signed the Mecklenburg Resolves, more popularly known as the Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence. While not a true declaration of independence from British rule, it is among the first such declarations that eventually led to the American Revolution. May 20, the traditional date of the signing of the declaration, is celebrated annually in Charlotte as "MecDec", with musket and cannon fire by reenactors in Independence Square. North Carolina's state flag and state seal also bear the date. . . ."
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