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George Vancouver
A portrait from the late 18th century by an unknown artist, believed to depict George Vancouver
Born	(1757-06-22)22 June 1757 King's Lynn, Norfolk
Died	10 May 1798(1798-05-10) (aged 40) Petersham, Surrey
Allegiance	Great Britain
Branch	Royal Navy
Rank	Captain
Commands	HMS Discovery
Signature

Captain George Vancouver (/vænˈkuːvər/; 22 June 1757 – 10 May 1798) was a Royal Navy officer and explorer best known for leading the Vancouver Expedition, which explored and charted North America's northwestern Pacific Coast regions, including the coasts of what became the Canadian province of British Columbia and the U.S. states of Alaska, Washington, Oregon and California. The expedition also explored the Hawaiian Islands and the southwest coast of Australia.

Various places named for Vancouver include Vancouver Island; the city of Vancouver in British Columbia; Vancouver River on the Sunshine Coast of British Columbia; Vancouver, Washington, in the United States; Mount Vancouver on the Canadian–US border between Yukon and Alaska; and New Zealand's fourth-highest mountain, also Mount Vancouver.^[1]

Vancouver was born on 22 June 1757 in the seaport town of King's Lynn in Norfolk, England. He was the sixth and youngest child of John Jasper Vancouver, a Dutch-born deputy collector of customs, and Bridget Berners. The surname Vancouver comes from Coevorden, Drenthe province, Netherlands (Koevern in Dutch Low Saxon).^{[citation needed]}

In 1771, at age 13, Vancouver entered the Royal Navy as a "young gentleman", a future candidate for midshipman.^[2] He was nominally classified as an able seaman (AB), but sailed as one of the midshipmen^[3] aboard HMS Resolution, on James Cook's second voyage (1772–1775) searching for Terra Australis. He also sailed with Cook's third voyage (1776–1780), this time aboard Resolution's companion ship, HMS Discovery (1774), and was present during the first European sighting and exploration of the Hawaiian Islands.^[4]

Upon his return to Britain in October 1780, Vancouver was commissioned as a lieutenant and posted aboard the sloop HMS Martin, initially on escort and patrol duty in the English Channel and North Sea. He accompanied the ship when it left Plymouth on 11 February 1782 for the West Indies. On 7 May 1782 he was appointed fourth lieutenant of the 74-gun ship of the line HMS Fame, which was at the time part of the British West Indies Fleet and assigned to patrolling the French-held Leeward Islands. Vancouver subsequently saw action at the Battle of the Saintes (April 1782), wherein he distinguished himself. Vancouver returned to England in June 1783.^[5]

In the late 1780s, the Spanish Empire commissioned an expedition to the Pacific Northwest. In 1789, the Nootka Crisis developed, and Spain and Britain came close to war over ownership of Nootka Sound on contemporary Vancouver Island, and – of greater importance – over the right to colonise and settle the Pacific Northwest coast. Henry Roberts had recently taken command of the survey ship HMS Discovery (a new vessel named in honour of the ship on Cook's voyage^[6][7]) with the prospect of another round-the-world voyage, and Roberts selected Vancouver as his first lieutenant, but they both were then posted to other warships due to the crisis. Vancouver went with Joseph Whidbey to the 74-gun ship of the line HMS Courageux. When the first Nootka Convention ended the crisis in 1790, Vancouver was given command of Discovery to take possession of Nootka Sound and to survey the coasts.^[8][9]

Departing England with two ships, HMS Discovery and HMS Chatham, on 1 April 1791, Vancouver commanded an expedition charged with exploring the Pacific region. In its first year the expedition travelled to Cape Town, Australia, New Zealand, Tahiti, and Hawaii (then known as the Sandwich Islands), collecting botanical samples and surveying coastlines along the way. He formally claimed at Possession Point, King George Sound Western Australia, which became the town of Albany, Western Australia, for the British. Proceeding to North America, Vancouver followed the coasts of modern-day Oregon and Washington northward. In April 1792 he encountered American Captain Robert Gray off the coast of Oregon just prior to Gray's sailing up the Columbia River.

Vancouver entered the Strait of Juan de Fuca, between Vancouver Island and the modern Washington state mainland, on 29 April 1792. His orders included a survey of every inlet and outlet on the west coast of the mainland, all the way north to Alaska. Most of this work was in small craft propelled by both sail and oar; manoeuvring larger sail-powered vessels in uncharted waters was generally impractical and dangerous.

Vancouver named many features for his officers, friends, associates, and his ship Discovery, including:

• Mount Baker – after Discovery's 3rd Lieutenant Joseph Baker, the first on the expedition to spot it
• Mount St. Helens – after his friend, Alleyne FitzHerbert, 1st Baron St Helens
• Puget Sound – after Discovery's 2nd lieutenant Peter Puget,^[10] who explored its southern reaches.
• Mount Rainier – after his friend, Rear Admiral Peter Rainier.
• Port Gardner and Port Susan, Washington – after his former commander Vice Admiral Sir Alan Gardner and his wife Susannah, Lady Gardner.
• Whidbey Island – after naval engineer Joseph Whidbey.
• Discovery Passage, Discovery Island, Discovery Bay, Port Discovery and Discovery Park (Seattle).
• Orford Reef, after Horace Walpole

After a Spanish expedition in 1791, Vancouver was the second European to enter Burrard Inlet on 13 June 1792, naming it for his friend Sir Harry Burrard. It is the modern-day main harbour area of the City of Vancouver beyond Stanley Park. He surveyed Howe Sound and Jervis Inlet over the next nine days.^[11] Then, on his 35th birthday on 22 June 1792, he returned to Point Grey, the present-day location of the University of British Columbia. Here he unexpectedly met a Spanish expedition led by Dionisio Alcalá Galiano and Cayetano Valdés y Flores. Vancouver was "mortified" (his word) to learn they already had a crude chart of the Strait of Georgia based on the 1791 exploratory voyage of José María Narváez the year before, under command of Francisco de Eliza. For three weeks they cooperatively explored the Georgia Strait and the Discovery Islands area before sailing separately towards Nootka Sound.

After the summer surveying season ended, in August 1792, Vancouver went to Nootka, then the region's most important harbour, on contemporary Vancouver Island. Here he was to receive any British buildings and lands returned by the Spanish from claims by Francisco de Eliza for the Spanish crown. The Spanish commander, Juan Francisco Bodega y Quadra, was very cordial and he and Vancouver exchanged the maps they had made, but no agreement was reached; they decided to await further instructions. At this time, they decided to name the large island on which Nootka was proven to be located as Quadra and Vancouver Island. Years later, as Spanish influence declined, the name was shortened to simply Vancouver Island.^[12]

While at Nootka Sound Vancouver acquired Robert Gray's chart of the lower Columbia River. Gray had entered the river during the summer before sailing to Nootka Sound for repairs. Vancouver realised the importance of verifying Gray's information and conducting a more thorough survey. In October 1792, he sent Lieutenant William Robert Broughton with several boats up the Columbia River. Broughton got as far as the Columbia River Gorge, sighting and naming Mount Hood.^[13]

Vancouver sailed south along the coast of Spanish Alta California, entered San Francisco Bay, later visiting Monterey; in both places, he was warmly received by the Spanish.^[14] Later he visited Chumash villages at Point Conception and near Mission San Buenaventura.^[15] Vancouver spent the winter in continuing exploration of the Sandwich Islands, the contemporary name of the islands of Hawaii.

The next year, 1793, he returned to British Columbia and proceeded further north, unknowingly missing the overland explorer Alexander Mackenzie by only 48 days. He got to 56°30'N, having explored north from Point Menzies in Burke Channel to the northwest coast of Prince of Wales Island. He sailed around the latter island, as well as circumnavigating Revillagigedo Island and charting parts of the coasts of Mitkof, Zarembo, Etolin, Wrangell, Kuiu and Kupreanof Islands.^[16] With worsening weather, he sailed south to Alta California, hoping to find Bodega y Quadra and fulfil his territorial mission, but the Spaniard was not there. The Spanish governor refused to let a foreign official into the interior. Vancouver noted that the region's "only defenses against foreign attack are a few poor cannons".^[14] He again spent the winter in the Sandwich Islands.

In 1794, he first went to Cook Inlet, the northernmost point of his exploration, and from there followed the coast south. Boat parties charted the east coasts of Chichagof and Baranof Islands, circumnavigated Admiralty Island, explored to the head of Lynn Canal, and charted the rest of Kuiu Island and nearly all of Kupreanof Island.^[16] He then set sail for Great Britain by way of Cape Horn, returning in September 1795, thus completing a circumnavigation of South America.

Impressed by the view from Richmond Hill, Vancouver retired to Petersham, then in Surrey and part of modern London.^[17]

Vancouver faced difficulties when he returned home to England. The accomplished and politically well-connected naturalist Archibald Menzies complained that his servant had been pressed into service during a shipboard emergency; sailing master Joseph Whidbey had a competing claim for pay as expedition astronomer; and Thomas Pitt, 2nd Baron Camelford, whom Vancouver had disciplined for numerous infractions and eventually sent home in disgrace, proceeded to harass him publicly and privately.

Pitt's allies, including his cousin, Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger, attacked Vancouver in the press. Thomas Pitt took a more direct approach; on 29 August 1796 he sent Vancouver a letter heaping many insults on the head of his former captain, and challenging him to a duel. Vancouver gravely replied that he was unable "in a private capacity to answer for his public conduct in his official duty", and offered instead to submit to formal examination by flag officers. Pitt chose instead to stalk Vancouver, ultimately assaulting him on a London street corner. The terms of their subsequent legal dispute required both parties to keep the peace, but nothing stopped Vancouver's civilian brother Charles from interposing and giving Pitt blow after blow until onlookers restrained the attacker. Charges and counter-charges flew in the press, with the wealthy Camelford faction having the greater firepower until Vancouver, ailing from his long naval service, died.

Vancouver, at one time amongst Britain's greatest explorers and navigators, died in obscurity on 10 May 1798 at the age of 40, less than three years after completing his voyages and expeditions.^[18] No official cause of death was stated, as the medical records pertaining to Vancouver were destroyed; one doctor named John Naish claimed Vancouver died from kidney failure, while others believed it was a hyperthyroid condition.^[19]

Vancouver's grave is in the churchyard of St Peter's Church, Petersham, in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames, England. The Hudson's Bay Company placed a memorial plaque in the church in 1841.^[20] His grave in Portland stone, renovated in the 1960s, is now Grade II listed in view of its historical associations.^[20][21]

Vancouver determined that the Northwest Passage did not exist at the latitudes that had long been suggested. His charts of the North American northwest coast were so extremely accurate that they served as the key reference for coastal navigation for generations. Robin Fisher, the academic vice-president of Mount Royal University in Calgary and author of two books on Vancouver, states:

He put the northwest coast on the map...He drew up a map of the north-west coast that was accurate to the 9th degree, to the point it was still being used into the modern day as a navigational aid. That's unusual for a map from that early a time.^[22]

However, Vancouver failed to discover two of the largest and most important rivers on the Pacific coast, the Fraser River and the Columbia River. He also missed the Skeena River near Prince Rupert in northern British Columbia. Vancouver did eventually learn of the Columbia River before he finished his survey—from Robert Gray, captain of the American merchant ship that conducted the first Euroamerican sailing of the Columbia River on 11 May 1792, after first sighting it on an earlier voyage in 1788. However, neither the Columbia River nor the Fraser River were included on any of Vancouver's charts.

Stephen R. Bown noted in Mercator's World magazine's November/December 1999 issue that:

Vancouver, Washington
City
Skyline of Vancouver with Mount St. Helens in the background Vancouver Barracks Esther Short Park House of Providence Old Apple Tree Park Fort Vancouver
Flag Logo
Motto(s):  A colorful past, a bright future
Location in Washington
Coordinates: 45°37′52″N 122°40′18″W / 45.63111°N 122.67167°W / 45.63111; -122.67167
Country	United States
State	Washington
County	Clark
Founded	1825
Incorporated	January 23, 1857
Named after	George Vancouver
Government
• Type	Council–manager
• Body	Vancouver City Council
• Mayor	Anne McEnerny-Ogle
Area [1]
• City	52.45 sq mi (135.84 km2)
• Land	48.74 sq mi (126.25 km2)
• Water	3.70 sq mi (9.59 km2)
Elevation [2]	180 ft (50 m)
Population  (2020)[3]
• City	190,915
• Estimate  (2024)[4]	198,992
• Rank	U.S.: 130th WA: 4th
• Density	3,784.32/sq mi (1,461.14/km2)
• Urban	2,104,238 (US: 23rd)
• Metro	2,509,489 (US: 25th)
Demonym	Vancouverite
Time zone	UTC−8 (Pacific (PST))
• Summer (DST)	UTC−7 (PDT)
ZIP Codes	98660–98666, 98668, 98682–98687
Area code(s)	360, 564
FIPS code	53-74060
GNIS feature ID	2412146[2]
Website	cityofvancouver.us

Vancouver (/vænˈkuːvər/ ^ⓘ van-KOO-vər) is a city on the north bank of the Columbia River in the U.S. state of Washington, located in Clark County. Founded in 1825 and incorporated in 1857, Vancouver had a population of 190,915 as of the 2020 census,^[3] making it the fourth-most populous city in Washington State. Vancouver is the county seat of Clark County and forms part of the Portland-Vancouver metropolitan area, the 25th-largest metropolitan area in the United States. Originally established in 1825 around Fort Vancouver, a fur-trading outpost, the city is located on the Washington–Oregon border along the Columbia River, directly north of Portland.

Vancouver shares its name with the larger city of Vancouver in southern British Columbia, Canada, approximately 300 miles (480 km) to the north. Both cities were named after British sea captain George Vancouver, but the U.S. city is older. Vancouver, British Columbia, was incorporated 29 years after the incorporation of Vancouver, Washington, and more than 60 years after the name Vancouver was first used in reference to the historic Fort Vancouver trading post on the Columbia River. City officials have periodically suggested changing the U.S. city's name to Fort Vancouver to reduce confusion with its larger and better-known northern neighbor. Many Pacific Northwest residents distinguish between the two cities by referring to the Canadian city as "Vancouver, B.C." and the United States city as "Vancouver, Washington", or "Vancouver, USA".^[5][6][7] Local nicknames formerly included "Vantucky" (though this is used as a derogatory term)^{[8][9][10][11][12]} and "The 'Couv(e)".^[13]

The Vancouver area was inhabited by several Native American tribes, most recently the Chinook and Klickitat nations, with permanent settlements of timber longhouses.^[14] The Chinookan and Klickitat names for the area were reportedly Skit-so-to-ho and Ala-si-kas, respectively, meaning "land of the mud-turtles".^[15][16] First known European contact was made by William Robert Broughton in 1792,^[17][18] with approximately half of the indigenous population killed by smallpox before the Lewis and Clark Expedition arrived in the area in 1806.^[14] Within another fifty years, other diseases such as measles, malaria and influenza had reduced the Chinookan population from an estimated 80,000 "to a few dozen refugees, landless, slaveless and swindled out of a treaty".^[14]

Meriwether Lewis wrote that the Vancouver area was "the only desired situation for settlement west of the Rocky Mountains". The first permanent European settlement did not occur until 1824, when Fort Vancouver was established as a fur trading post of the Hudson's Bay Company. From that time on, the area was settled by both the US and Britain under a "joint occupation" agreement. Joint occupation led to the Oregon boundary dispute and ended on June 15, 1846, with the signing of the Oregon Treaty, which gave the United States full control of the area. Before 1845, American Henry Williamson laid out a large claim west of the Hudson's Bay Company (including part of the present-day Port of Vancouver), called Vancouver City and properly registered his claim at the U.S. courthouse in Oregon City, before leaving for California.^[19]: 42 In 1848, Williamson had it surveyed and platted by Peter Crawford. In 1850, Amos Short traced over the claim of Williamson and named the town Columbia City.^[20] It changed to Vancouver in 1855. The City of Vancouver was incorporated on January 23, 1857.^[21]

Based on an act of the 1859–60 legislature, Vancouver was briefly the capital of Washington Territory, before capital status was returned to Olympia by a 2–1 ruling of the territorial supreme court, in accordance with Isaac Stevens' preference and concern that proximity to the border with Oregon might give some of the state's influence away to Oregon.^[22][23][24]

The neighborhood of Sifton was the terminus of an early electric trolley operated by the Northcoast Power Company that also served nearby Orchards from 1910 until 1926. The trolleys made ten stops and ran once per hour, charging 15 cents each way. A mural in the heart of Orchards depicts the trolley and the rural character of the area at the time it was operating. The community was named after Doctor Sifton, a promoter of the trolley service.^[25]

According to the archives of the Vancouver Columbian newspaper, the Orchards-Sifton route ran along Vancouver's Main Street to 26th Street (renamed Fourth Plain Blvd.), then from 26th to K Street and thence north to 33rd Street. From there, it ran on 33rd over Burnt Bridge Creek and past the city limits. At that point the trolley became more like a regular train as it followed a cut through the wilderness. Few houses were seen between Vancouver and Orchards. The public's growing preference for motor cars in the 1920s heralded the end of the trolley.

Separated from Oregon until 1917, when the new Interstate Bridge began to replace ferries, Vancouver had three shipyards just downstream which produced ships for World War I before World War II brought an enormous economic boom. An Alcoa aluminum plant opened on September 2, 1940, using inexpensive power from the nearby New Deal hydropower turbines at Bonneville Dam. After the bombing of Pearl Harbor, Henry Kaiser opened a shipyard next to the U.S. Army base, which by 1944 employed as many as 36,000 people in a twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week production of Liberty ships, landing ship tanks, and escort carriers. This influx of shipyard workers boosted the population from 18,000 to over 80,000 in just a few months, leading to the creation of the Vancouver Housing Authority and six new residential developments: Fruit Valley, Fourth Plain Village, Bagley Downs, Ogden Meadows, Burton Homes and McLoughlin Heights. Each of these was later incorporated into the city, and are well-known neighborhoods, while the neighboring "shipyard city" of Vanport, Oregon, would be destroyed by the Memorial Day flood of 1948.^{[citation needed]}

Vancouver has experienced conflicts with other Clark County communities because of rapid growth in the area. ^{[citation needed]} The city's first annexation more than doubled its size in 1909, with the largest annexation of 1997 adding 11,258 acres (45.56 km²) and 58,171 residents.^[26] As a result of urban growth and the 1997 annexation, Vancouver is often thought of as split between two areas, ^{[citation needed]} East and West Vancouver, divided by NE Andresen Road. West Vancouver is home to downtown Vancouver and most of the more historical parts of the city, as well as recent high-density mixed-use development. East Vancouver includes the communities of Cascade Park East and West, which had populations of 6,996 and 6,956 in 1990, before annexation.

More than one-third of the Vancouver urban area's population lives in unincorporated urban areas north of the city limits, including the communities of Hazel Dell, Felida, Orchards and Salmon Creek. If county leaders had approved another major annexation plan in 2006, Vancouver would have surpassed Tacoma and Spokane to become the state's second-largest city.^[27]

During 1852–54, future United States President Ulysses S. Grant, then a captain in the U.S. Army, was quartermaster at what was then known as Columbia Barracks. Soon after leaving Vancouver, Grant resigned from the army and did not serve again until the outbreak of the American Civil War in 1861. Other notable generals to have served in Vancouver include George B. McClellan, Philip Sheridan, Oliver O. Howard and 1953 Nobel Peace Prize recipient George C. Marshall.^[28]

Army presence in Vancouver was very strong, as the Department of the Columbia built and moved to Vancouver Barracks, the military reservation for which stretched from the river to what is currently Fourth Plain Boulevard and was the largest Army base in the region until surpassed by Fort Lewis, 120 miles (190 km) to the north. Built on the old company gardens and skirmish range, Pearson Army Field (later Pearson Field) was a key facility, and at one point the US Army Signal Corps operated the largest spruce cut-up plant in the world to provide much-needed wood for airplanes. Vancouver became the end point for two ultra-long flights from Moscow, USSR, over the North Pole. The first of these flights was performed by Valery Chkalov in 1937 on a Tupolev ANT-25RD airplane. Chkalov was originally scheduled to land at an airstrip on Swan Island in nearby Portland, Oregon, but was redirected at the last minute to Vancouver's Pearson Airfield. In June 1975, a monument was dedicated commemorating the event near State Highway 14, then moved to the north side of Pearson Field in 1987. Chkalov Drive, in east Vancouver, was named in his honor.

Vancouver is located just north of the Columbia River and the Oregon border, just west of where the Columbia River Gorge bisects the volcanic Cascade Range and just east of where the Willamette River enters the Columbia. The city of Vancouver is in the Western Lowlands region of Washington. When clouds do not blanket the Puget–Willamette trough formed by the Cascade and Coast Range, Mount Hood, Mount St. Helens, Mount Rainier, Mount Jefferson and Mount Adams are all visible from Vancouver.

According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 49.86 sq mi (129.14 km²), of which 46.46 sq mi (120.33 km²) is land and 3.4 sq mi (8.81 km²) is water.^[29]

Vancouver lies just north of Portland, Oregon, with which it shares a similar climate. Both are classified as warm-summer Mediterranean (Csb) on the Köppen climate classification, but with certain key differences. High pressures east of the Cascade Range create something of a venturi effect, leading to cold east winds down the Columbia River Gorge. Unsheltered by the Willamette Valley, Vancouver has historically seen colder temperatures, including "silver thaw" storms where freezing rain cakes limbs and power lines. Such storms can paralyze Vancouver. This occasionally freezes the river, and in 1916 cut electric power in the city for almost two weeks. Rainfall occurs frequently throughout the fall, winter, and spring, but ceases around the middle of June, with dry and warm weather lasting through September. Average annual precipitation is 42 in (1,100 mm). Heavy snowfalls are infrequent and snow often falls and doesn't stick, with major snowstorms only occurring every 2–4 years. Close proximity to the river was also a concern for flooding, before dams constricted the river, destroying features such as Celilo Falls. Periodic floods have been a nuisance, with two of the most destructive occurring in June 1894 and May 1948. The 1948 Columbia River flood almost topped the Interstate Bridge's support piers and completely destroyed nearby Vanport, Oregon. Other unusual storms include the Columbus Day Storm of 1962 and an April 5, 1972, tornado which rated F3 on the Fujita scale, striking a local school. An EF1 tornado struck on January 10, 2008, just after noon, causing moderate damage along a two-mile (3.2 km) path from Vancouver Lake to the unincorporated Hazel Dell area.^{[citation needed]}

Because many Vancouver residents work in Portland, there is typically significant rush-hour traffic congestion on two bridges that cross the Columbia River – the Interstate Bridge and the Glenn Jackson Bridge. In 2017 there were 297,932 weekday vehicle crossings on the two bridges.^[30]

As of the 2020 census, there were 190,915 people, and 75,663 households in the county.^[3] The population density was 3,917.2/sq mi.The racial makeup of the city was 76.5% White, 2.3% African American, 0.6% Native American, 5.5% Asian, 1.6% Pacific Islander, and 9.1% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino people of any race were 14.7% of the population.^[3]

The average household size was 2.46 people.^[3]

22.1% of the population were under 18, and 6.2% were under 5. 15.7% of people were older than 65. The gender makeup of the city was 50.6% female, and 49.4% male.^[3]

The median household income was $67,462, but the per capita income was $36,053. 12.7% of the population was below the poverty line.^[3]

The ancestry of the city is 16.1% German, 10.9% English, 9.7% Irish, 3.9% Norwegian, 2.9% Italian, 2.8% French,1.5% Polish, and 0.7% Subsaharan African.^[3]

As of the 2010 census, there were 161,791 people, 65,691 households, and 40,246 families residing in the city. The population density was 3,482.4/sq mi (1,344.6/km²). There were 70,005 housing units at an average density of 1,506.8/sq mi (581.8/km²). The racial makeup of the city was 80.9% White, 2.9% African American, 1.0% Native American, 5.0% Asian, 1.0% Pacific Islander, 4.3% from other races, and 4.8% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino people of any race were 10.4% of the population.

There were 65,691 households, of which 31.9% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 42.6% were married couples living together, 13.2% had a female householder with no husband present, 5.5% had a male householder with no wife present, and 38.7% were non-families. 30.0% of all households were made up of individuals, and 9.9% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.43 and the average family size was 3.02.

The median age in the city was 35.9 years. 24% of residents were under the age of 18; 9.4% were between the ages of 18 and 24; 28.9% were from 25 to 44; 25.3% were from 45 to 64; and 12.4% were 65 years of age or older. The gender makeup of the city was 48.8% male and 51.2% female.

As of the 2000 census, there were 143,560 people, 56,628 households, and 36,298 families living in the city. The population density is 3,354.7 people per square mile (1,295.3 people/km²). There were 60,039 housing units at an average density of 1,403.0 units per square mile (541.7 units/km²). According to the 2000 census, The racial makeup of the city was 76.2% White, 2.9% African American, 1.0% Native American, 5.0% Asian, 1.0% Pacific Islander, and 4.80% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino people of any race were 10.4% of the population. 16.4% were of German, 9.2% English, 8.4% Irish and 7.9% American ancestry. 89.2% spoke English, 5.1% Spanish, 3.2% Russian, 1.4% Ukrainian and 1.1% Vietnamese at home.

There were 56,628 households, out of which 33.4% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 47.3% were married couples living together, 12.1% had a female householder with no husband present, and 35.9% were non-families. 27.6% of all households were made up of individuals, and 8.3% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.50 and the average family size was 3.06.

In the city, 26.7% of the population was under the age of 18, 9.8% was from 18 to 24, 32.1% from 25 to 44, 20.6% from 45 to 64, and 10.7% was 65 years of age or older. The median age was 33 years. For every 100 females, there were 96.9 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 93.8 males.

The median income for a household in the city was $41,618, and the median income for a family was $47,696. Males had a median income of $37,306 versus $26,940 for females. The per capita income for the city was $20,192. 9.4% of families and 12.2% of the population were below the poverty line, including 16.1% of those under the age of 18 and 8.2% of those 65 and older.

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Vancouver, Washington" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (May 2013) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

The Vancouver economy is characterized by border economics with neighboring Portland, Oregon. The state of Washington levies no individual or corporate income taxes and levies a property tax below the national average and a sales tax above the national median.^[36] The State of Oregon has even lower property taxes and no sales tax but one of the highest state income taxes.^[37] As a result, many Vancouver residents prefer to shop in neighboring Portland where they do not pay sales taxes,^[38] then live and work in Vancouver where they do not pay state income tax (though Washington residents who work in Oregon must pay Oregon income tax.) For the same reasons, the city is popular with retirees. Conversely, the city is less favored by students and young adults.^{[citation needed]} In 2003, 70% of workers in Vancouver worked in Clark County. There is a risk in sales tax avoidance because Washington has a use tax due on all purchases made in Oregon that are then returned to Washington. Vancouver residents "shop at their own risk" when attempting to avoid the sales tax in Washington, although the rule is rarely, if ever, enforced^{[citation needed]} except for purchases requiring registration, such as motor vehicles.

The taxation and demographics of the area depresses the retail sector of Vancouver's economy.^{[citation needed]} Oregon has stricter development laws to protect the timber industry;^{[citation needed]} therefore, Vancouver tends to attract a higher proportion of the region's sprawling development. The voting base also led to rejection of extension of Portland's light-rail system into the city for several years.^{[citation needed]} In 2013, Washington transitioned away from being a control state.

The economic history of Vancouver reflects the region. Moving from a salmon- and trade-based indigenous economy by the Chinook people, the Hudson's Bay Company pioneered extractive industries such as the fur trade and timber. Subsistence agricultural gave way to market and export crops such as apples, strawberries and prunes. Largely bypassed by the railroad in the 1880s, when the Oregon Steam Navigation company would ferry trains across the river downstream from St. Helens, Oregon to Kalama, Washington, early downtown development was focused around Washington Street (where ferries arrived), lumber and Vancouver Barracks activities such as a large spruce mill for manufacturing airplanes. A 1908 railroad swing bridge across the Columbia allowed greater industrial developments such as the Standifer Shipyard during the first world war.^[39] With the Interstate Bridge and Bonneville Dam Vancouver saw an industrial boom in the 1940s, including the Kaiser shipyard and Alcoa, as well as a Boise Cascade paper mill, just west of the Interstate Bridge.^[19]

As the old-growth forests were depleted and heavy industry left the United States, Vancouver's economy largely changed to high tech and service industry jobs, with many residents commuting to Portland. Vancouver contains the corporate headquarters for Nautilus, Inc., ZoomInfo, Papa Murphy's Pizza and The Holland (parent company of the Burgerville restaurant chain).^[40]

The Port of Vancouver USA operates a port on the Columbia River, which separates Oregon to the south and Washington to the north. It handles over 400 ocean-going vessels annually, as well as a number of barges which ply the river and its tributaries as far as Lewiston, Idaho.

The Vancouver Energy project was a proposed crude oil transport hub in the Port of Vancouver USA. It was estimated to produce the equivalent of $1.6 billion in employment income during the terminal's construction and for its first 15 years of operation.^[41] Vancouver Energy ended its bid to build the hub in February 2018 following Governor Jay Inslee's rejection of the project.^[42]

In 2017, there were 4,550 employer firms.^[43] 2,143 of these firms were shown to be owned by men, and 943 were shown to be owned by women. 556 of the firms were shown to be owned by minorities, and 3,234 were not shown to be owned by minorities. 241 of these firms were owned by veterans.^[43]

According to the city's 2022 Annual Comprehensive Financial Report,^[44] the largest employers in the city are:

In 1997, the city of Vancouver decided to dedicate the next 15–20 years to redeveloping and revitalizing the downtown core, west of I-5 and south of Evergreen Boulevard. The first projects started in the early 2000s with the construction of many tall condominium structures around Esther Short Park. The most lauded outside investment was the construction of a Hilton hotel directly across from the park.^{[citation needed]} The Downtown redevelopment of Vancouver continued after a slowdown during the 2009–2012 recession. Numerous projects began to rise up around the city core and as of mid-2020 more than three dozen projects with mid-rise or high-rise structures were completed, under construction, or proposed.^[45][46]

In 2016 the first ground was broken^[47] for the $1.5 billion, 21-block redevelopment of Vancouver's waterfront at the former site of Boise Cascade Paper Mill. The site had been inaccessible to the public for more than 100 years.^{[citation needed]} The project was planned for 3,300 residential units, and roughly 1 million square feet (93,000 m²) of office and retail space.^[48] Around 15,000 people were in attendance for the official grand opening, in 2018, of the project and associated public space including Grant Street Pier, a cable-stayed viewing deck that extends out over the Columbia River.^[49][50]

The Redevelopment of Terminal One master plan was approved by the city council in 2017.^[51] This $500 million project will include multiple phases over several years including a seven-story AC Marriott hotel that began site preparation and construction in late 2019.^[52] Future plans in the master plan called for a mixed-use complex of mid-rise buildings on four blocks and a complete rebuild of the original 100-year-old Terminal One dock and pier. A public open-air market is also planned.

The Columbian newspaper moved to a new seven-story office building adjacent to the Hilton in 2008. Two years later, The Columbian filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and the building defaulted to Bank of America. In June 2010, the City of Vancouver agreed to purchase the office building for use as a new city hall for $18.5 million, a fraction of the $41.5 million sale price the owners of The Columbian office building had been asking prior to filing for bankruptcy. In 2011, the city consolidated five separate buildings housing 300 employees into the new building, located at 415 W. 6th Street. The move saved the city approximately $1 million a year in facility lease and maintenance costs.^[53]

The Fort Vancouver Regional Library District opened a new library on C Street at Evergreen Boulevard in 2011. Future plans on C Street include a new Marriott hotel and roughly 250 new condominiums.

 

Panoramic scrolling image of Vancouver skyline taken from Hayden Island in 2023

Search engine marketing (SEM) is a form of Internet marketing that involves the promotion of websites by increasing their visibility in search engine results pages (SERPs) primarily through paid advertising.^[1] SEM may incorporate search engine optimization (SEO), which adjusts or rewrites website content and site architecture to achieve a higher ranking in search engine results pages to enhance pay-per-click (PPC) listings and increase the call to action (CTA) on the website.^[2]

In 2007, U.S. advertisers spent US $24.6 billion on search engine marketing.^[3] In Q2 2015, Google (73.7%) and the Yahoo/Bing (26.3%) partnership accounted for almost 100% of U.S. search engine spend.^[4] As of 2006, SEM was growing much faster than traditional advertising and even other channels of online marketing.^[5] Managing search campaigns is either done directly with the SEM vendor or through an SEM tool provider. It may also be self-serve or through an advertising agency.

Search engine marketing is also a method of business analytics, which is mainly aimed at providing useful information for organizations to find business opportunities and generate profits. SEM can help organizations optimize their marketing and gather more audience and create more customers.^[6]

As of October 2016, Google leads the global search engine market with a market share of 89.3%. Bing comes second with a market share of 4.36%, Yahoo comes third with a market share of 3.3%, and Chinese search engine Baidu is fourth globally with a share of about 0.68%.^[7]

In August 2024, Google's search engine was declared by a court to be a monopoly over the market.^[8] During the trial, the US Department of Justice argued "Google hasn’t just illegally cornered the market in search — it’s squeezed online publishers and advertisers with a “trifecta” of monopolies that have harmed virtually the entire World Wide Web"^[9]

As the number of sites on the Web increased in the mid-to-late 1990s, search engines started appearing to help people find information quickly. Search engines developed business models to finance their services, such as pay per click programs offered by Open Text^[10] in 1996 and then Goto.com^[11] in 1998. Goto.com later changed its name^[12] to Overture in 2001, was purchased by Yahoo! in 2003, and now offers paid search opportunities for advertisers through Yahoo! Search Marketing. Google also began to offer advertisements on search results pages in 2000 through the Google AdWords program. By 2007, pay-per-click programs proved to be primary moneymakers^[13] for search engines. In a market dominated by Google, in 2009 Yahoo! and Microsoft announced the intention to forge an alliance. The Yahoo! & Microsoft Search Alliance eventually received approval from regulators in the US and Europe in February 2010.^[14]

Search engine optimization consultants expanded their offerings to help businesses learn about and use the advertising opportunities offered by search engines, and new agencies focusing primarily upon marketing and advertising through search engines emerged. The term "search engine marketing" was popularized by Danny Sullivan in 2001^[15] to cover the spectrum of activities involved in performing SEO, managing paid listings at the search engines, submitting sites to directories, and developing online marketing strategies for businesses, organizations, and individuals.

Search engine marketing uses at least five methods and metrics to optimize websites.^[16]

1. Keyword research and analysis involve three "steps": ensuring the site can be indexed in the search engines, finding the most relevant and popular keywords for the site and its products, and using those keywords on the site in a way that will generate and convert traffic. A follow-on effect of keyword analysis and research is the search perception impact. Search perception impact describes the identified impact of a brand's search results on consumer perception, including title and meta tags, site indexing, and keyword focus. As online searching is often the first step for potential consumers/customers, the search perception impact shapes the brand impression for each individual.
2. Website saturation and popularity, or how much presence a website has on search engines, can be analyzed through the number of pages of the site that are indexed by search engines (saturation) and how many backlinks the site has (popularity). It requires pages to contain keywords people are looking for and ensure that they rank high enough in search engine rankings. Most search engines include some form of link popularity in their ranking algorithms. The following are major tools measuring various aspects of saturation and link popularity: Link Popularity, Top 10 Google Analysis, and Marketleap's Link Popularity and Search Engine Saturation.
3. Back end tools, including Web analytic tools and HTML validators, provide data on a website and its visitors and allow the success of a website to be measured. They range from simple traffic counters to tools that work with log files and to more sophisticated tools that are based on page tagging (putting JavaScript or an image on a page to track actions). These tools can deliver conversion-related information. Validators check the invisible parts of websites, highlighting potential problems and many usability issues and ensuring websites meet W3C code standards. Try to use more than one HTML validator or spider simulator because each one tests, highlights, and reports on slightly different aspects of your website.
4. Whois tools reveal the owners of various websites and can provide valuable information relating to copyright and trademark issues.
5. Google Mobile-Friendly Website Checker: This test will analyze a URL and report if the page has a mobile-friendly design.^[17]

Search engine marketing is a way to create and edit a website so that search engines rank it higher than other pages. It should be also focused on keyword marketing or pay-per-click advertising (PPC). The technology enables advertisers to bid on specific keywords or phrases and ensures ads appear with the results of search engines.

With the development of this system, the price is growing under a high level of competition. Many advertisers prefer to expand their activities, including increasing search engines and adding more keywords. The more advertisers are willing to pay for clicks, the higher the ranking for advertising, which leads to higher traffic.^[18] PPC comes at a cost. The higher position is likely to cost $5 for a given keyword, and $4.50 for a third location. A third advertiser earns 10% less than the top advertiser while reducing traffic by 50%.^[18]

Investors must consider their return on investment when engaging in PPC campaigns. Buying traffic via PPC will deliver a positive ROI when the total cost-per-click for a single conversion remains below the profit margin. That way the amount of money spent to generate revenue is below the actual revenue generated.

There are many reasons explaining why advertisers choose the SEM strategy. First, creating a SEM account is easy and can build traffic quickly based on the degree of competition. The shopper who uses the search engine to find information tends to trust and focus on the links showed in the results pages. However, a large number of online sellers do not buy search engine optimization to obtain higher ranking lists of search results but prefer paid links. A growing number of online publishers are allowing search engines such as Google to crawl content on their pages and place relevant ads on it.^[19] From an online seller's point of view, this is an extension of the payment settlement and an additional incentive to invest in paid advertising projects. Therefore, it is virtually impossible for advertisers with limited budgets to maintain the highest rankings in the increasingly competitive search market.

Google's search engine marketing is one of the western world's marketing leaders, while its search engine marketing is its biggest source of profit.^[20] Google's search engine providers are clearly ahead of the Yahoo and Bing network. The display of unknown search results is free, while advertisers are willing to pay for each click of the ad in the sponsored search results.

Paid inclusion involves a search engine company charging fees for the inclusion of a website in their results pages. Also known as sponsored listings, paid inclusion products are provided by most search engine companies either in the main results area or as a separately identified advertising area.

The fee structure is both a filter against superfluous submissions and a revenue generator. Typically, the fee covers an annual subscription for one webpage, which will automatically be catalogued on a regular basis. However, some companies are experimenting with non-subscription based fee structures where purchased listings are displayed permanently. A per-click fee may also apply. Each search engine is different. Some sites allow only paid inclusion, although these have had little success. More frequently, many search engines, like Yahoo!,^[21] mix paid inclusion (per-page and per-click fee) with results from web crawling. Others, like Google (and as of 2006, Ask.com^[22][23]), do not let webmasters pay to be in their search engine listing (advertisements are shown separately and labeled as such).

Some detractors of paid inclusion allege that it causes searches to return results based more on the economic standing of the interests of a web site, and less on the relevancy of that site to end-users.

Often the line between pay per click advertising and paid inclusion is debatable. Some have lobbied for any paid listings to be labeled as an advertisement, while defenders insist they are not actually ads since the webmasters do not control the content of the listing, its ranking, or even whether it is shown to any users. Another advantage of paid inclusion is that it allows site owners to specify particular schedules for crawling pages. In the general case, one has no control as to when their page will be crawled or added to a search engine index. Paid inclusion proves to be particularly useful for cases where pages are dynamically generated and frequently modified.

Paid inclusion is a search engine marketing method in itself, but also a tool of search engine optimization since experts and firms can test out different approaches to improving ranking and see the results often within a couple of days, instead of waiting weeks or months. Knowledge gained this way can be used to optimize other web pages, without paying the search engine company.

SEM is the wider discipline that incorporates SEO. SEM includes both paid search results (using tools like Google AdWords or Bing Ads, formerly known as Microsoft adCenter) and organic search results (SEO). SEM uses paid advertising with AdWords or Bing Ads, pay per click (particularly beneficial for local providers as it enables potential consumers to contact a company directly with one click), article submissions, advertising and making sure SEO has been done. A keyword analysis is performed for both SEO and SEM, but not necessarily at the same time. SEM and SEO both need to be monitored and updated frequently to reflect evolving best practices.

In some contexts, the term SEM is used exclusively to mean pay per click advertising,^[2] particularly in the commercial advertising and marketing communities which have a vested interest in this narrow definition. Such usage excludes the wider search marketing community that is engaged in other forms of SEM such as search engine optimization and search retargeting.

Creating the link between SEO and PPC represents an integral part of the SEM concept. Sometimes, especially when separate teams work on SEO and PPC and the efforts are not synced, positive results of aligning their strategies can be lost. The aim of both SEO and PPC is maximizing the visibility in search and thus, their actions to achieve it should be centrally coordinated. Both teams can benefit from setting shared goals and combined metrics, evaluating data together to determine future strategy or discuss which of the tools works better to get the traffic for selected keywords in the national and local search results. Thanks to this, the search visibility can be increased along with optimizing both conversions and costs.^[24]

Another part of SEM is social media marketing (SMM). SMM is a type of marketing that involves exploiting social media to influence consumers that one company’s products and/or services are valuable.^[25] Some of the latest theoretical advances include search engine marketing management (SEMM). SEMM relates to activities including SEO but focuses on return on investment (ROI) management instead of relevant traffic building (as is the case of mainstream SEO). SEMM also integrates organic SEO, trying to achieve top ranking without using paid means to achieve it, and pay per click SEO. For example, some of the attention is placed on the web page layout design and how content and information is displayed to the website visitor. SEO & SEM are two pillars of one marketing job and they both run side by side to produce much better results than focusing on only one pillar.

Paid search advertising has not been without controversy and the issue of how search engines present advertising on their search result pages has been the target of a series of studies and reports^[26][27][28] by Consumer Reports WebWatch. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) also issued a letter^[29] in 2002 about the importance of disclosure of paid advertising on search engines, in response to a complaint from Commercial Alert, a consumer advocacy group with ties to Ralph Nader.

Another ethical controversy associated with search marketing has been the issue of trademark infringement. The debate as to whether third parties should have the right to bid on their competitors' brand names has been underway for years. In 2009 Google changed their policy, which formerly prohibited these tactics, allowing 3rd parties to bid on branded terms as long as their landing page in fact provides information on the trademarked term.^[30] Though the policy has been changed this continues to be a source of heated debate.^[31]

On April 24, 2012, many started to see that Google has started to penalize companies that are buying links for the purpose of passing off the rank. The Google Update was called Penguin. Since then, there have been several different Penguin/Panda updates rolled out by Google. SEM has, however, nothing to do with link buying and focuses on organic SEO and PPC management. As of October 20, 2014, Google had released three official revisions of their Penguin Update.

In 2013, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals held in Lens.com, Inc. v. 1-800 Contacts, Inc. that online contact lens seller Lens.com did not commit trademark infringement when it purchased search advertisements using competitor 1-800 Contacts' federally registered 1800 CONTACTS trademark as a keyword. In August 2016, the Federal Trade Commission filed an administrative complaint against 1-800 Contacts alleging, among other things, that its trademark enforcement practices in the search engine marketing space have unreasonably restrained competition in violation of the FTC Act. 1-800 Contacts has denied all wrongdoing and appeared before an FTC administrative law judge in April 2017.^[32]

Google Ads is recognized as a web-based advertising utensil since it adopts keywords that can deliver adverts explicitly to web users looking for information in respect to a certain product or service. It is flexible and provides customizable options like Ad Extensions, access to non-search sites, leveraging the display network to help increase brand awareness. The project hinges on cost per click (CPC) pricing where the maximum cost per day for the campaign can be chosen, thus the payment of the service only applies if the advert has been clicked. SEM companies have embarked on Google Ads projects as a way to publicize their SEM and SEO services. One of the most successful approaches to the strategy of this project was to focus on making sure that PPC advertising funds were prudently invested. Moreover, SEM companies have described Google Ads as a practical tool for increasing a consumer’s investment earnings on Internet advertising. The use of conversion tracking and Google Analytics tools was deemed to be practical for presenting to clients the performance of their canvas from click to conversion. Google Ads project has enabled SEM companies to train their clients on the utensil and delivers better performance to the canvass. The assistance of Google Ads canvass could contribute to the growth of web traffic for a number of its consumer’s websites, by as much as 250% in only nine months.^[33]

Another way search engine marketing is managed is by contextual advertising. Here marketers place ads on other sites or portals that carry information relevant to their products so that the ads jump into the circle of vision of browsers who are seeking information from those sites. A successful SEM plan is the approach to capture the relationships amongst information searchers, businesses, and search engines. Search engines were not important to some industries in the past, but over the past years the use of search engines for accessing information has become vital to increase business opportunities.^[34] The use of SEM strategic tools for businesses such as tourism can attract potential consumers to view their products, but it could also pose various challenges.^[35] These challenges could be the competition that companies face amongst their industry and other sources of information that could draw the attention of online consumers.^[34] To assist the combat of challenges, the main objective for businesses applying SEM is to improve and maintain their ranking as high as possible on SERPs so that they can gain visibility. Therefore, search engines are adjusting and developing algorithms and the shifting criteria by which web pages are ranked sequentially to combat against search engine misuse and spamming, and to supply the most relevant information to searchers.^[34] This could enhance the relationship amongst information searchers, businesses, and search engines by understanding the strategies of marketing to attract business.

• Dynamic keyword insertion
• Search engine manipulation effect
• Search engine reputation management
• Web marketing
• User intent
• Search engine privacy
• Mobile marketing