Campinas history · History of Campinas
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History of Campinas
History of Campinas
The city was founded on July 14, 1774, by Barreto Leme, initially as a simple outpost on the way to Minas Gerais and Goiás serving the "Bandeirantes" who were in search of precious minerals and Indian slaves. In the first half of the 19th century, Campinas became a growing population center, with many coffee, cotton and sugarcane farms. The construction of a railway linking the city to São Paulo and Santos' seaport, in 1867, was very important for its growth. In the second half of the 19th century, with the abolition of slavery, farming and industrialization attracted many foreign immigrants to replace the lost manpower, mainly from Italy.
Coffee became an important export and the city became wealthy. In consequence, a large service sector was established to serve the growing population, and in the first decades of the 20th century, Campinas could already boast of an opera house, theaters, banks, movie theaters, radio stations, a philharmonic orchestra, two newspapers, a good public education system, hospitals, and the most important Brazilian research center in agricultural sciences. Finally, the construction of the first Brazilian highway in 1938, between Campinas and São Paulo, the Anhanguera Highway, was a turning point in the integration of Campinas into the rest of the state.
Campinas was the birthplace of opera composer Carlos Gomes (1836—1896) and of the President of the Republic Campos Salles (1841—1913), both of whom have small museums here in their honor today.
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Campinas Travel Guide from Wikitravel. Many thanks to all Wikitravel contributors. Text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0, images are available under various licenses, see each image for details.