San Juan, officially Municipio de la Ciudad Capital San Juan Bautista (Municipality of the Capital City, Saint John the Baptist), is the capital and most populous municipality in the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, an unincorporated territory of the United States. As of the 2010 census, it had a population of 395,326 making it the 46th-largest city under the jurisdiction of the United States. San Juan was founded by Spanish colonists in 1521, who called it Ciudad de Puerto Rico ("Rich Port City"). Puerto Rico's capital is the second oldest European-established capital city in the Americas, after Santo Domingo, in the Dominican Republic. Several historical buildings are located in San Juan; among the most notable are the city's former defensive forts, Fort San Felipe del Morro and Fort San Cristóbal, and La Fortaleza, the oldest executive mansion in continuous use in the Americas. Today, San Juan is one of Puerto Rico's most important seaports,[8] and is the island's manufacturing[citation needed], financial, cultural, and tourism center. The population of the Metropolitan Statistical Area, including San Juan and the municipalities of Bayamón, Guaynabo, Cataño, Canóvanas, Caguas, Toa Alta, Toa Baja, Carolina and Trujillo Alto, is about 2 million inhabitants; thus, about half the population of Puerto Rico now lives and works in this area. San Juan is also a principal city of the San Juan-Caguas-Fajardo Combined Statistical Area. The city has been the host of numerous important events within the sports community, including the 1979 Pan American Games, 1966 Central American and Caribbean Games, events of the 2006, 2009 and 2013 World Baseball Classics, the Caribbean Series and the Special Olympics and MLB San Juan Series in 2010. San Juan is cataloged as a global city, according to the Globalization and World Cities Research Network studies from the Loughborough University in London. Which classifies San Juan as "Beta" city. Technological advances after World War II in the development of the airliner, coupled with the island's climate and natural setting, have transformed San Juan into the springboard for tourism around the island, and has made the rest of the Caribbean known throughout the world during the last fifty years. Today the capital features numerous hotels, museums, historical buildings, restaurants, beaches and shopping centers. In San Juan there are numerous tourist attractions, including: Old San Juan, Ocean Park, Isla Verde and Condado. Places and monuments emphasized in tourism campaigns include: Old San Juan, promoting the historic nature of its colonial buildings and narrow streets covered by adoquine, a blue stone cast from furnace slag; they were brought over as ballast on Spanish ships. This includes the city's ancient defensive wall and forts, most notably El Morro and the Castle of San Cristóbal. On January 23, 1984 both of these edifices were catalogued as being part of humanity's cultural patrimony. The numerous restaurants and art galleries in the zone are frequently visited by tourists. The local universities are promoted as historic places, most notably the campus of University of Puerto Rico located in Río Piedras, which is the oldest university on the island being founded in 1903. San Juan is the birthplace of numerous artists and musicians, locally known as Sanjuaneros, who have significantly influenced Puerto Rican culture. During the 20th century, the musical aspect of the city was influenced by performers including Afro-Caribbean dancer and choreographer Sylvia del Villard and José Enrique Pedreira who became a renowned composer of Puerto Rican Danzas. International musicians such as renowned opera singer Justino Díaz and Grammy Award winners Ramón Ayala (Daddy Yankee) and Ricky Martin were born in the city. Other notable residents include writers Giannina Braschi and Tomas Blanco, award-winning actors Raúl Juliá and Benicio del Toro, and comedian José Miguel Agrelot. Rafael Cordero (1790--1868), was influential in the development of Puerto Rican education and is renowned as " The Father of Public Education in Puerto Rico." The city is also the home of numerous contemporary and classic art museums. The Puerto Rico Arts Museum owns the largest collection of contemporary art in Puerto Rico, housing over 1,100 permanent art pieces and displaying numerous temporary exhibitions containing artwork from various locations through Latin America. The Puerto Rico Museum of Contemporary Art, located in Santurce, specializes in contemporary artwork from Latin America and the Caribbean. The paintings displayed in the permanent exhibition are either acquired by the museum's administrative personnel or donated by artists and collectors.

• published: 26 Jan 2014
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