On the admission of Indiana as a state, Congress gave to it four sections of public land as a site on which to establish a state capital. This was located in 1820 in almost the exact geographical centre of the state, where a small settlement had recently been made, and the town of Indianapolis was laid out in the following year. It was then in the midst of dense forests and was wholly unconnected by roads with other parts of the state. Upon its final acceptance as the capital, there was some activity in land speculation, but Indianapolis had only 600 inhabitants and a single street when the seat of government was removed thither in 1824. The legislature met here for the first time in 1825. Some impetus was given to the city's growth by the completion of the National Road, and later by the opening of railways, but until after the Civil War its advancement was slow. It was incorporated as a town in 1832, its population then being 1000. The first state capitol was completed in 1836. Indianapolis suffered severely from the business panic of 1837, and ten years later, when it received its first city charter, it had only about 6000 inhabitants; in the same year a free public school system was inaugurated. AUTHORITIES.--B. R. Sulgrove, _History of Indianapolis and Marion County_ (Philadelphia, 1884); M. R. Hyman, _Handbook of Indianapolis_ (Indianapolis, 1907); Nathaniel Bolton, "Early History of Indianapolis and Central Indiana" (Indiana Historical Society's _Publications_, No. 5, 1897); W. R. Holloway, _Indianapolis, a Historical and Statistical Sketch_ (Indianapolis, 1870); the Indianapolis Board of Trade's _Report on the Industries of Indianapolis_ (1889); _Civic Studies of Indianapolis_ (Indianapolis, 1907 seq.), edited by Arthur W. Dunne; and P. S. Heath's sketch of Indianapolis in L. P. Powell's _Historic Towns of the Western States_ (New York, 1901).