MILAN

village, Erie and Huron counties, northern Ohio, U.S., on the Huron River, just southeast of Sandusky. In 1804 Moravian missionaries established an Indian village called Pequotting on the site. Settlers from Connecticut arrived a few years later, and the village was laid out in 1816 by Ebenezer Merry and named for Milan, Italy. A canal was dug (183239) connecting the town to Lake Erie via the Huron River, and the community became a busy wheat-shipping centre. The village's refusal, however, to allow the Lake Shore and Michigan Railroad a right-of-way marked its decline as a commercial centre. Milan, now a quiet, rustic community, is the birthplace of the inventor Thomas Alva Edison (1847); the red-brick house on Edison Drive, where he spent the first seven years of his life, is preserved as a museum. The home of Lehman Galpin, the Edison family doctor, is now a local historical museum. Pop. (1990) 1,464. Italian Milano, city, capital of Milan province and of Lombardy region (Lombardia), northern Italy. Milan is the leading financial centre of Italy and its most prosperous manufacturing and commercial city. Milanese assert that it is the ideological, if not the actual, capital of Italy. Settled by the Gauls in about 600 BC, the site has had a long and often turbulent history. Milan is situated north of the Po River in the heart of the Po Basin, halfway across the plain spreading between the Ticino and the Adda rivers. To the north lies the great sweep of the southern flank of the Alps. Milan's winters are chilly and damp and its summers hot and humid. Milan owes its economic supremacy largely to its geographical position at the centre of the traffic routes of the Val Padana (Po Valley). Industries predominate in the economy of modern Milan and its metropolitan area; of major importance are the production of vehicles, electric appliances, railroad materials, textiles and clothing, and chemicals and related items. Papermaking and publishing, food processing, production of rubber goods, and tourism are also important. Milan is Italy's principal centre of exchange and has the country's largest stock market. The course of walled fortifications can still be traced in contemporary streets. The 15th-century Castello Sforzesco and the 14th-century Duomo (cathedral), the great Piazza del Duomo (1489), and the commercial Piazza Cordusio dominate the modern city centre. Most industrial growth has been concentrated in peripheral areas; entire industrial districts have developed, mainly in the north and northeast and in the south and southwest. Many old streets and buildings have been demolished to make way for massive new city blocks and high rises. Though central Milan's transportation is encumbered by narrow streets, the newer suburban areas are linked to the core of of the city by major arterial highways. Milan's most striking architectural achievement is the medieval Duomo, the third largest church of Europe. The most notable of the city's many palaces is the Palazzo di Brera, the construction of which began in 1651. The Pinacoteca di Brera contains an excellent collection of northern Italian painting as well as the Biblioteca Nazionale Braidense. San Simpliciano, located on the Corso Garibaldi, is an ancient church that was founded in the first centuries of the Christian Era; the fresco Coronation of the Virgin ornaments its apse. Leonardo da Vinci's Last Supper, one of the most famous paintings of the Renaissance, is in the former refectory of the convent of Sta. Maria delle Grazie. Milan is rich in galleries, museums, libraries, and theatres; La Scala (177678) is one of the great opera houses of the world. Milan is the seat of three universities. Other institutes of higher education include the Polytechnic Institute of Milan and the Giuseppe Verdi Conservatory of Music. An extensive network of roads and rail lines spreading toward outlying areas, and particularly toward the north, gives Milan an economic advantage over other Italian cities. Trans-Alpine tunnels and other connections link the city with all parts of Europe. Milan is the starting point of the famous scenic route known as the Autostrada del Sole, which stretches down the spine of the Italian peninsula. Two international airports serve Milan, the Aeroporto di Linate, which is 6 mi (10 km) east of the city, and the Aeroporto della Malpensa, 29 mi to the northwest. Area city, 70 sq mi (182 sq km). Pop. (1984 est.) 1,561,438. Italian Milano city, capital of Milan province and of Lombardy region (Lombardia), northern Italy. It is the leading financial centre and the most prosperous manufacturing and commercial city of Italy. The destiny of Milan, like that of many of the world's great cities, remains something of a historical paradox. There are powerful factors supporting the argument that Milan should have become the capital of a unified Italy, and this is the belief of many Milanese, in spite of the fact that the unity of Italy was actually born in Turin, rather than in Milan, in 1870. Milan, nevertheless, is the most industrious and vital city to have achieved prominence since the ancient land of Italy became aware of itself as a modern nation. Additional reading For descriptions of the modern city, see Federico Elmo (ed.), Milan and Its Environs (1955); Emidio Bissi, Milan: An Artistic and Illustrated Guide-Book (1958); and Carlo Ripa Di Meana (ed.), Tutta Milano: Tourist Guide (1973). For architecture, see Carlo Romussi, Milano ne' suoi monumenti, 3rd ed., 2 vol. (191213); Nancy A. Houghton Brown, The Milanese Architecture of Galeazzo Alessi, 2 vol. (1982), concentrating on Renaissance architecture; and Giacomo C. Bascap, Luigi Medici, and Ulderico Tegani, Vecchia e nuova Milano (1980); and Yukio Futagawa (ed.), Carlo Aymonino, Aldo Rossi: Housing Complex at the Gallaratese Quarter, Milan, Italy 19691974 (1977), both of which provide views of modern architectural developments. City planning is addressed in Maurizio Boriani et al., La construzione della Milano moderna (1982); and Patrizia Gabellini, Corinna Morandi, and Paola Vidulli (eds.), Urbanistica a Milano, 19451980 (1980). Giorgio Lotti and Raul Radice, La Scala (1979; originally published in Italian, 1977), describes this cultural and historical landmark. Social and economic conditions of the contemporary city are studied in Two Cultures, Two Cities (1977), the proceedings of a symposium held in Toronto in 1976; and in John R. Low-Beer, Protest and Participation: The New Working Class in Italy (1978). The Storia di Milano, published by the Fondazione Treccani degli Alfieri, 16 vol. (195362), is the fullest historical account; but Giorgio Giulini, Memorie spettanti alla storia di Milano, new ed., 7 vol. (185457), is still useful for the Middle Ages. Ella Noyes, The Story of Milan (1908, reprinted 1921), which provides an introductory account in English, focuses on the medieval town. Later historical sources include Franco Fava, Storia di Milano, 3 vol. (198082); and Richard Krautheimer, Three Christian Capitals: Topography and Politics (1983). Alberto Lecco