- Centralia
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/sen trayl"yeuh, -tray"lee euh/, n.1. a city in central Illinois. 15,126.2. a town in SW Washington. 10,809.
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city, Marion and Clinton counties, south-central Illinois, U.S. It lies about 60 miles (100 km) east of St. Louis (Saint Louis), Missouri. Centralia was founded in 1853 by the Illinois Central Railroad (from which its name derives), and railroad shops and fruit growing formed the basis of the local economy. The town was settled largely by German immigrants, whose influence is still evident. Oil was discovered in the area in the 1930s. Centralia was the site of a devastating coal-mining disaster in 1947, when 111 miners died after being trapped by an explosion. The railroad is still important to the local economy, and other economic activities include agriculture (dairying, soybeans, corn [maize], wheat, and livestock), coal mining, oil and natural gas production, food processing, and light manufacturing (automobile parts, fuses, paper packaging, fibreglass, and plastics). Centralia is the site of the Warren G. Murray Developmental Center for the developmentally disabled; it is also the seat of Kaskaskia (community) College (founded in 1940 as Centralia Junior College). Centralia features a 160-foot (50-metre) carillon tower, built in 1982. A hot-air balloon festival is held annually in August. At nearby Carlyle Lake are Eldon Hazlet and South Shore state parks. Inc. 1859. Pop. (1990) 14,274; (2000) 14,136.city, Lewis county, southwest Washington, U.S., near the confluence of the Chehalis and Skookumchuck rivers. It lies midway between Portland, Oregon, and Seattle, Washington. The town site, then in Oregon Territory, was founded in 1852 by J.G. Cochran and George Washington; Washington, the son of an African slave and an Englishwoman, had been denied the right to settle, and Cochran, his adoptive father, had filed the claim for him. Washington purchased the claim from his father when the newly created Washington Territory established different ownership laws. He platted the city as Centerville in 1875; it was renamed Centralia in 1891.Lumbering is Centralia's chief industry; the economy depends also on dairying, poultry raising, and fruit farming in the area. Centralia (community) College was established in 1925. Nearby Fort Borst Park contains Borst Blockhouse (1852) and Borst Farmstead (1860). The city centre contains several buildings that are listed on the National Register of Historic Places, as well as a monument (1924) to the victims of the Centralia Massacre (1919), an incident in the region's violent labour history. Inc. 1886. Pop. (1990) 12,101; (2000) 14,742.* * *
Universalium. 2010.
