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Spokane

Spokane (pronounced spô-CAN ) is the county seat of Spokane County in the State of Washington, USA. It was originally incorporated as "Spokan Falls" (without an 'e' at the end), drawing on the Native American tribe known as the Spokanee, which means "Children of the Sun." Nicknamed "The Lilac City" because of the fragrant flowers that bloom throughout the area in mid-spring. However city management recently felt a new title was in order, "Near Nature, Near Perfect". Spokane is the second largest city in Washington state and the metropolitan center of the Inland Northwest. It is home to several colleges and universities, the most prominent being Gonzaga University and Whitworth College. There is also a downtown University District which includes extension campuses and departments for Washington State University (based in Pullman) and Eastern Washington University (based in Cheney). Eastern also has a downtown Spokane Center which houses a number of graduate programs, including the Inland Northwest Center for Writers.

The town site was originally platted, about 1880, surrounding the falls of the Spokane River, where the river descends from the Selkirk Mountain range into the Columbia Plateau. Spokane is 280 miles east of Seattle and 375 miles northeast of Portland. It is the urban commercial center of the eastern part of Washington and the northern part of Idaho, and acts as the distribution point for a major agricultural, lumber, mining, horticultural, and livestock raising region. The 2000 U.S. census showed that the city population was 197,400, and the county had a population of 417,939. The most recent state figures, released in April of 2006, show that the city population has since crossed the next century mark to 201,600, while metropolitan estimates show the area has more than half a million people, and may be approaching 600,000.