History of Bloomington, Indiana
Bloomington is a city in south central Indiana. Located about 50 miles southwest of Indianapolis, it is the county seat of Monroe County, Indiana|Monroe County. As of the 2000 U.S. Census, Bloomington had a total population of 69,291, making it the 7th largest city in Indiana.
Bloomington is the home of Indiana University's Indiana University (Bloomington)|flagship campus (established in 1820) attended by about 40,000 students and the largest and original campus of the Indiana University system. It is also the home of the Indiana University School of Law - Bloomington, the Kinsey Institute, and The Midwest Proton Radiotherapy Institute.
Bloomington's Indiana University campus is regarded as one of the most beautiful university campuses in the U.S. In 1991, Thomas Gaines, a landscape artist, published a book, The Campus As a Work of Art, in which he named the Bloomington campus one of the five most beautiful campuses in America. Most of the campus buildings are built of Indiana limestone. Due to the presence of the university, Bloomington is more diverse demographically than is typical for the state.
Bloomington has been named a Tree City USA|Tree City for more than 20 years. The city was the site of the Academy Awards|Academy Award-winning movie Breaking Away, featuring the annual IU bicycle race Little 500.
Bloomington has town twinning|sister-city relationships with Posoltega, Nicaragua and Santa Clara, Cuba.
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