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Customer Service Center

(Located diagonally across the street rom City Hall)City Center Building, 1st Floor

220 East HuronAnn Arbor, MI 48104

(734) 994-2700Fax: (734) 994-1765

E-mail: customerservice@a2gov.org

Welcome to

Sunday Morning Milles in Ann Arbor

-by Carl

Several annual events many o them centered onperorming and visual arts draw visitors to AnnArbor. One such event is the Ann Arbor Art Fairs, a

set o our concurrent juried airs held on downtownstreets, which began in 1960. Scheduled on Wednes-day through Saturday in the third week o July, theairs draw upward o hal a million visitors. One eventthat is not related to visual and perorming arts isHash Bash, held on the rst Saturday o April, ostensi-bly in support o the reorm o marijuana laws. It has

been celebrated since 1971.

Welcome

A person rom Ann Arbor is called an "Ann Ar-borite", and many long-time residents call them-selves "townies". Te city itsel is oen called A("A-squared") or A2 ("A two"), and, less commonly,ree own. Recently, some youths have taken to call-ing Ann Arbor Ace Deuce or simply Te Deuce. Withtongue-in-cheek reerence to the city's liberal politicalleanings, some occasionally reer to Ann Arbor as TePeople's Republic o Ann Arbor or 25 square milessurrounded by reality, the latter phrase being adaptedrom Wisconsin Governor Lee Dreyus's descrip-tion o Madison, Wisconsin. Ann Arbor sometimesappears on citation indexes as an author, instead o alocation, oen with the academic degree MI, a misun-

derstanding o the abbreviation or Michigan.

Ann Arbor

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Ann Arbor is a city in the U.S. state o Michigan and

the county seat o Washtenaw County. It is the state's

seventh largest city with a population o 114,024 as o

the 2000 Census, o which 36,892 (32%) are univer-sity or college students. Te city, which is part o the

Detroit-Ann Arbor-Flint, MI CSA, is named aer the

spouses o the city's ounders and or the stands o

trees in the area.

Ann Arbor was ounded in January 1824 by John

Allen and Elisha Rumsey, both o whom were land

speculators. On May 25, 1824, the town plot was

registered with Wayne County as "Annarbour". Te

city became the seat o Washtenaw County in 1827,

and was incorporated as a village in 1833. Te town

became a regional transportation hub in 1839 withthe arrival o the Michigan Central Railroad, and

was chartered as a city in 1851. During the 1960s and

1970s, the city gained a reputation as a center or lib-

eral politics. During the 20th century, the economy o

Ann Arbor underwent a gradual shi rom a manu-

acturing base to a service and technology base, which

accelerated in the 1970s and 1980s.

Ann Arbor is home to the University o Michigan,

established in 1837. As the dominant institution o

higher learning in the city and one o the top public

universities in the world, the university provides AnnArbor with a distinct college-town atmosphere. Te

university shapes Ann Arbor's economy signicantly

as it employs about 30,000 workers, including about

7,500 in the medical center. Te city's economy is also

centered on high-technology, with several companies

drawn to the area by the university's research and

development money, and by its graduates. On the

other hand, Ann Arbor has increasingly ound itsel

grappling with the efects o sharply rising land values

and gentrication, as well as urban sprawl stretching

ar into the outlying countryside.

Many Ann Arbor cultural attractions and events

are sponsored by the University o Michigan. Sev-

eral perorming arts groups and acilities are on the

university's campus, as are museums dedicated to art,

archaeology, and natural history and sciences (see

Museums at the University o Michigan). Regional

and local perorming arts groups not associated with

the university include the Ann Arbor Civic Teatre;

the Arbor Opera Teater; the Ann Arbor Symphony

Orchestra; the Ann Arbor Ballet Teater; the Ann

Arbor Civic Ballet (established in 1954 as Michigan's

rst chartered ballet company); and Perormance Net-work, which operates a downtown theater requently

ofering new or nontraditional plays.

Te Ann Arbor Hands-On Museum, located in a ren-

ovated and expanded historic downtown re station,

contains more than 250 interactive exhibits eaturing

science and technology. Multiple art galleries exist in

the city, notably in the downtown area and around the

University o Michigan campus. Aside rom a large

restaurant scene in the Main Street, South State Street,

and South University Avenue areas, Ann Arbor ranks

rst among U.S. cities in the number o booksellers

and books sold per capita. Te Ann Arbor District

Library maintains our branch outlets in addition to

its main downtown building; in 2008 a new branch

building replaced the branch located in Plymouth

Mall. Tis new branch is called the raverwood

Branch, and opened on June 30, 2008. Te city is also

home to the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library.