Annapolis, Maryland, United States

🇺🇸 Annapolis, the capital of the U.S. state of Maryland, also functions as the county seat of Anne Arundel County. Situated on the Chesapeake Bay at the mouth of the Severn River, 25 miles south of Baltimore and about 30 miles east of Washington, D.C., Annapolis forms part of the Baltimore-Washington metropolitan area.

This city served as the seat of the Confederation Congress (former Second Continental Congress) and temporary national capital of the United States in 1783–1784. At that time, General George Washington came before the body convened in the new Maryland State House and resigned his commission as commander of the Continental Army. A month later, the Congress ratified the Treaty of Paris of 1783, ending the American Revolutionary War, with Great Britain recognizing the independence of the United States. The city and state capitol was also the site of the 1786 Annapolis Convention, which issued a call to the states to send delegates for the Constitutional Convention to be held the following year in Philadelphia. Over 220 years later, the Annapolis Peace Conference took place in 2007.

Annapolis is the home of St. John's College, founded 1696; the United States Naval Academy, established 1845, is adjacent to the city limits.

A settlement in the Province of Maryland named "Providence" was founded on the north shore of the Severn River on the middle Western Shore of the Chesapeake Bay in 1649 by Puritan exiles from the Province/Dominion of Virginia led by the third Proprietary Governor of Maryland, William Stone (1603–1660). The settlers later moved to a better-protected harbor on the Severn's southern shore. The settlement on the south shore, known from 1683 as "Town at Proctor's", then "Town at the Severn", became in 1694 "Anne Arundel's Towne" (after Lady Ann Arundell (1616–1649), the late wife of the late Cecilius Calvert, second Lord Baltimore, 1605–1675).

In 1654, after the Third English Civil War, Parliamentary forces assumed control of the Maryland colony and Stone went into exile south across the Potomac River in Virginia. Per orders from Lord Baltimore], Stone returned the following spring at the head of a Cavalier royalist force, loyal to the uncrowned King of England. On March 25, 1655, in what became known as the Battle of the Severn (the first colonial naval battle in North America), Stone was defeated, taken prisoner, and replaced by Lt. Gen. Josias Fendall (1628–1687) as fifth Proprietary Governor. Fendall governed Maryland during the latter half of the English Commonwealth period. In 1660, he was replaced by Phillip Calvert (1626–1682) as fifth/sixth Governor of Maryland, after the restoration of Charles II (1630–1685) as King in England.

In 1694, soon after the overthrow of the Catholic government of second Royal Governor Thomas Lawrence (1645–1714, in office for a few months in 1693), the third Royal Governor Francis Nicholson (1655-1727/28, in office: 1694–1698), moved the capital of the royal colony, the Province of Maryland, to Anne Arundel's Towne and renamed the town "Annapolis" after Princess Anne of Denmark and Norway, soon to become Queen Anne of Great Britain (1665–1714, reigned 1702–1714). Annapolis was incorporated as a city in 1708. Colonel John Seymour, the Governor of Maryland from 1704 to 1709, wrote Queen Anne on March 16, 1709, with qualifications for municipal officials and provisions for fairs and market days for the town.

17th-century Annapolis was little more than a village, but it grew rapidly for most of the 18th century until the American Revolutionary War as a political and administrative capital, a port of entry, and a major centre of the Atlantic slave trade.

Located 25 miles (40 km) south of Baltimore and 30 miles (48 km) east of Washington, D.C., Annapolis is the closest state capital to the national capital.

Tidal flooding In November 2020, NASA reported that Annapolis had 18 days of high-tide (non-storm-related) flooding from May 2019 to April 2020, an increase over 2018's 12 days, and higher than the 1995-2005 average of 2 days annually. The increase is attributed to sea level rise caused by climate change. Resultant flood damages caused local businesses to lose as much as $172,000 a year. On Naval Academy grounds, seawater came out of storm drains, with McNair Road and Ramsay Road flooding 20 times in 2020 and more than 40 times each in 2018 and 2019. Adaptation approaches such as sea walls and building up the height of roadways and athletic fields are predicted to last only a few decades.

Neighborhoods and suburbs • Admiral Heights • Arnold • Arundel on the Bay • Cape St. Claire • Church Circle and St. Anne's Church (Episcopal /Anglican), central Annapolis with Anne Arundel County Courthouse (1812) with series of rear annexes. • Crofton • Crownsville • Eastport • Edgewater • Highland Beach • Gambrills • Hillsmere Shores • Londontowne • Main Street, City Dock and City Markethouse on waterfront • Millersville • Naval Academy • Odenton • Parole - Former site of Civil War era prisoner-of-war exchange of Camp Parole, 1861–1865, later 20th century residential and commercial development including first area shopping centre of Parole Center in 1960s. • Riva • St. Margaret's • State Circle and Maryland Avenue - Site of Maryland State House (Capitol) of 1770s-1780s with adjacent state office buildings for General Assembly (state legislature), executive departments, Lawyer's Mall civic plaza along Bladen Boulevard and Government House (Governor's Mansion) and U.S. Post Office building for Annapolis • West Annapolis • West Street / Arts District.

Economy According to a recent Financial Report, the top employers in the city, excluding state and local government, are: 1 United States Naval Academy; 2 ARC of the Central Chesapeake Region; 3 Annapolis Marriott Waterfront Hotel; 4 St. John's College; 5 Comtech Telecommunications Corp.; 6 Federal Catering; 7 Buddy's Crabs & Ribs, Inc.; 8 Loews Annapolis Hotel; 9 Severn Bancorp Inc.; 10 Rams Head Tavern, Inc.