All About Indiana
Indiana is a constituent state of the United States of America. The state sits, as its motto claims, at ''the crossroads of America.'' It borders Lake Michigan and the state of Michigan on the north, Ohio on the east, Kentucky on the south, and Illinois on the west, making it an integral part of the Midwest. Indiana's 36,185 square miles (93,720 square kilometres) also make it, except for Hawaii, the smallest state west of the Appalachian Mountains. The capital has been at Indianapolis since 1825, nine years after Indiana, the name generally thought to mean ''land of the Indians,'' was admitted on Dec. 11, 1816, as the 19th state of the Union.
Indiana, though officially an eastern north-central state of the United States, is perhaps the most Southern in character of all Northern states. This is largely a reflection of the early settlement of the region by immigrants from the Southern hills, who brought slavery and a hearty distrust of the federal government. Today Indiana is a manufacturing state; its northern half lies in the mainstream of the industrial belt stretching from Pennsylvania and New York to Illinois. Many of its people, nevertheless, continue to cherish an image derived from 19th-century America: largely white, dedicated to the Protestant ethic of sobriety and hard work, oriented to the small town and medium-sized city, and interested in maintaining the prerogatives of local self-determination. It is not by coincidence that Indiana's federal aid is one of the lowest per capita of any American state or that the Indianan's nickname, the Hoosier, remains a symbol in the nation's lore for a kind of homespun wisdom, wit, and folksiness that harkens back to what is popularly regarded as a less-hurried and less-sophisticated period of history.
The state's northwestern cities form an industrial, economic, and social continuum with neighbouring Chicago. Their heavy black populations and black political aspirations contrast strikingly with life in the cities and towns on the Ohio River. Thus, the state is at once Northern and black, Southern and white-dominated, with all the problems attendant on both circumstances. Though generally considered a conservative and Republican stronghold, Indiana has voted into both state and national office an almost equal number of liberals and Democrats.
Indiana forms part of the east central lowlands that slope downward from the Appalachian Mountains to the Mississippi River. Approximately five-sixths of its surface was modified by glacial action, leaving a vast quantity of excellent soil material and extensive deposits of sand and gravel. The more eroded southern part of the state gives way to the central plain, an extremely fertile agricultural belt with large farms, and then to the mostly flat glacial lake basin and moraine region of northern Indiana. The highest elevation is along the Ohio border, at 1,257 feet (383 metres) above sea level, while the low point, 320 feet (98 metres), is in the southwest where the Wabash River enters the Ohio. About 90 percent of the land lies between 500 and 1,000 feet.
Indiana's economy is concentrated in three sectors: manufacturing, services, and retail trade. Manufacturing accounts for about one-third of all jobs in the state and generates more than 40 percent of all personal income. The availability of labour and essential materials, as well as the state's location within 800 miles (1,280 kilometres) of 40 of the nation's 50 largest consumer and industrial markets and its high rank in interstate highway mileage, have all contributed to the growth of manufacturing in Indiana. Heavy industrialization, however, has made the state's economy vulnerable to recession. The American Railway Union, America's first industrial (as distinct from craft) union, was founded in Terre Haute in 1893 by Eugene Debs, five-time Socialist candidate for president. The following year it was involved in the Pullman strike that brought the intervention of federal troops and Debs's imprisonment. Since then Indiana has had its share of labour strife, especially in the steel industry, but, in general, business, labour, and government work to maintain an atmosphere attractive to industry.
Almost every citizen seems to participate in Hoosier Hysteria, the state's annual high-school basketball tournament. Notre Dame, well known for its gridiron-football talent, vies annually with Purdue and Indiana to provide Hoosiers with exceptional intercollegiate athletics. Indiana University has also become a mecca for basketball and for some of the world's greatest swimmers. Indianapolis is internationally known for the Indy 500, an auto race held annually on Memorial Day. The first race was held in 1911, while the city was still an automobile-manufacturing centre. The entire month of May has become devoted to the race, with such attendant events as a major professional golf meet. Indianapolis is also the home of the professional football Colts and is the site of the annual U.S. Clay Court Championships, which attract top international tennis players. In 1987 it became the second U.S. city to host the Pan-American Games. Hoosiers fond of the outdoors enjoy the state parks and forests and the many reservoirs, nature preserves, and wildlife areas. Indiana has many museums and historic sites, including the Levi Coffin House, a stop on the Underground Railroad, in Fountain City, and the Whitewater Canal, with a covered aqueduct, in Metamora.
Signs on the Indiana Toll Road proclaim the state to be the ''Main Street of the Midwest,'' perhaps a fair estimate of its position in interstate transportation, whether by highway, waterway, air, or rail. Indianapolis is served by more major highways than any other American city, and some of the nation's largest moving companies have their headquarters there. Responsibility for road construction and maintenance rests with city, county, state, and federal governments. Indiana ranks high nationally in road mileage per square mile of area, and almost all of its rural roads are paved. Though quantity may sometimes surpass quality of highway mileage, virtually all intrastate passengers and much commercial produce travel by road. Commercial air service is available in major Indiana cities, and there are more than 300 public and private airports in the state. The Ohio River, linking Indiana with the Mississippi River system, carries more low-cost freight than does the Panama Canal.
