Nassau, Bahamas

The city of Nassau is the capital of the Commonwealth of the Bahamas and the most populous city in the nation. Nassau is known for the charm of its old colonial buildings, the relaxing atmosphere of its many beaches, the business savvy of its commerce district, and the abundance of nightlife and sports options available to residents and visitors. It is also the gateway to the renowned resort center Paradise Island.

Landscape

The city of Nassau stretches along the northern coast of New Providence Island. The island is 33.79 kilometers (21 miles) long and 11.26 kilometers (7 miles) wide. It is located in the center of the Bahamian archipelago of over 700 islands in the North Atlantic Ocean, southeast of Florida and northeast of Cuba. The city of Nassau is just 290 kilometers (180 miles) southeast of Miami, Florida. The island is surrounded by white sand beaches and by one of the largest coral reefs in the world.

Two bridges connect the city of Nassau with the small resort location of Paradise Island. Because of Nassau's status as a capital city, and the popularity of Paradise Island as a tourist destination, New Providence Island is sometimes simply referred to as Nassau/Paradise Island.

Typical of the Bahamas, the climate of Nassau is tropical with July temperatures averaging 27.8 degrees Celsius (82 degrees Fahrenheit) and January temperatures averaging 21.1 degrees Celsius (69.9 degrees Fahrenheit). Water temperatures around the island never dip below 72 degrees Fahrenheit.

People

According to 2018 information, the last available statistics as of 2024, the population of metropolitan Nassau was estimated to be 280,000. Despite the fact that Nassau accounts for less than 2 percent of the land mass of the Bahamian islands, it houses 83.6 percent of the entire population of the commonwealth (estimated at 358,508 in 2023, according to the Central Intelligence Agency’s World Factbook ).

Nassau includes descendants of Black African enslaved people and European colonists. As of the 2010 census, about 90.6 percent of the Bahamian population was black, 4.7 percent was White, 2.1 percent was of mixed black and white descent, and about 1.7 percent identified as other or unspecified. The majority of white Bahamians are of English, Irish, and French descent. A socioeconomic class separation between Bahamians of African and European descent still exists. Bahamians of European and mixed-ethnicity are sometimes called Conchs or Conchy Joes, a pejorative term used to suggest the wealth and superiority of the colonial White loyalists.

At the time of the census, the majority of the population of Nassau was Protestant, at 69.9 percent of the population; 12 percent were Roman Catholic, 13 percent claimed another Christian denomination, and the remainder identified another religion or no religious affiliation. Within the Protestant population, 34.9 percent were Baptist. The Anglicans accounted for 13.7 percent of the Protestant population and are a carry-over from the British influence in Nassau. Likewise, the Catholic presence on the island is a remnant from the historic Spanish and Hispanic influences in the region.

Natives of Nassau are known as Nassuvians. Most Nassuvians are English-speaking. Those of African descent generally speak with a common West Indian dialect, while those of European descent speak with a slight British accent.

The most spectacular cultural celebration in Nassau is the Junkanoo Celebration. Parades are held in the early morning hours of December 26th and New Year's Day on Bay Street, the main street of downtown Nassau. The festival's origins derive from the slave period of Bahamian history. Slaves were given a separate holiday near Christmas to celebrate with their families. In remembrance of this, the Junkanoo Celebration includes African dance, music, and elaborate costumes, as well as spiritual elements of worship and joyfulness. The history of the name of the festival is more obscure. While some believe it comes from the French word L'inconnu, meaning "unknown," others think it may be an adaptation of the name John Canoe, an African tribal chief who demanded the right to celebrate with his people even after being brought to the Bahamas in slavery.

Economy

The tourism industry accounts for a large percentage of the gross domestic product (GDP) in the Bahamas. According to World Travel and Tourism Council data, a record 7.25 million tourists visited the island in 2019, bringing in more than $4.15 billion, about 32 percent of the nation's GDP. However, tourism numbers plummeted in 2020 in the wake of the global COVID-19 pandemic. By 2021, slightly more than 891,000 tourists visited the island. However, the industry started to bounce back in 2022, with tourism officials predicting a return to pre-pandemic numbers in 2023.

The majority of these revenues are brought in through Nassau and Paradise Island. More than half of the labor force of the Bahamas was employed either directly or indirectly through the tourism industry. A couple of the most lucrative tourist locations of the Bahamas are the Atlantis Casino on Paradise Island and the Crystal Palace Casino on Cable Beach. Nassau's Prince George Wharf also contributes to the tourism industry as a popular port of call for Caribbean cruise ships. The dock can support up to seven of the large-format cruise ships.

Plans for the Baha Mar megaresort were announced in 2005, but a Chinese investor's bankruptcy and construction delays stalled the project, leading to massive layoffs and a downgrade in the country's credit rating in 2016. Baha Mar was ultimately completed in 2017.

Second only to tourism, the primary industry of Nassau is banking. The industry focuses on offshore banking for businesses and investors from the United States. There are hundreds of banks and trust companies from numerous countries represented in the Bahamas. Banking in the Bahamas is governed by the Central Bank of the Bahamas, which operates out of Nassau.

In terms of manufacturing, Nassau is a prime location for businesses of all sorts due to the nation's many preferential trade, export, and duty-free tax agreements, particularly with the United States. Industries such as jewelry, shoes, garment manufacturing, light machinery, toy, and furniture assembly are popular in Nassau.

The economy of Nassau is supported to a large degree by Lynden Pindling International Airport, formerly Nassau International Airport. The airport is a key structure for both tourism and business and is located just 16 kilometers (10 miles) west of Nassau. The airport was renamed in July 2006 in honor of former Bahamian prime minister Lynden Oscar Pindling.

Landmarks

The straw market of Nassau celebrates one of the oldest industries of the islands and is the most famous location in the Bahamas for purchasing straw-craft souvenirs. Vendors at the market specialize in straw baskets, bags, and dolls made of plaited and decorated palm and sisal plant leaves woven primarily by local women. The straw souvenir industry was developed after the sponge industry of the Bahamas declined in the 1940s.

One of the most visited attractions of Nassau is the Queen's Staircase. The one-hundred-two-foot staircase was named in honor of the sixty-six year reign of Queen Victoria. Visitors to the staircase climb sixty-six steps carved out of solid limestone by enslaved people in the eighteenth century.

Fort Charlotte is the largest of the three forts found in Nassau. It was constructed in 1789 by Lord Dunmore to protect the west entrance to Nassau Harbor. It was named in honor of the wife of King George III, but it was originally known as "Dunmore's Folly," as the fortress cost eight times the projected sum. Although Fort Charlotte includes a waterless moat, a drawbridge, ramparts, and a dungeon, its cannons have never been fired in battle.

The most picturesque buildings in Nassau are the historical government buildings on Bay Street in Parliament Square. The square is home to the House of Assembly, the Senate, the Chambers of Parliament, the old colonial Secretary's Office, and a marble statue of Queen Victoria. Most of the buildings of this region were erected by the Loyalists near the beginning of the nineteenth century.

The Nassau Botanical Gardens cover a 7 hectare (18 acre) region of Nassau and include over six hundred varieties of shrubs, flowering plants, and cacti, including a collection of Bahamian orchids. The botanicals are all labeled and the flowering plants and ponds attract local wildlife.

Rising to a height of 65.83 meters (216 feet), the water tower in Nassau is the highest point on the island. The top of the tower provides a coast-to-coast view of New Providence Island.

History

The earliest inhabitants of Nassau were the Arawakan people or Lucayans, an indigenous Caribbean tribe. These natives were first encountered by the Spanish and later the British as exploration of the New World grew. With the arrival of settlers and the introduction of foreign disease and slavery, the Arawaks were largely overcome by European colonization.

In 1650 the town was founded by the British as Charles Town, but in 1684 the city was destroyed by fire by the Spanish. It was reconstructed and renamed after the Prince of Orange-Nassau in honor of King William II.

During the rest of the seventeenth century, the popularity of the trade route through Nassau Harbor made it a favorite target for pirates throughout the Caribbean. Infamous buccaneers such as Blackbeard, Sir Francis Drake, and Henry Morgan were common figures around the Bahamas during this time. Eventually the British gained control of the islands, and most of the pirates were killed by hanging. In 1728 the Bahamas become a colony of Great Britain and the region was stabilized.

During the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the port of Nassau was twice used for running contraband items for the United States. During the American Civil War, Southern blockade runners would travel from Charleston, South Carolina, to Nassau with shiploads of cotton, which they would then exchange with British ships for munitions and other marketable goods. Later during the Prohibition of the 1920s and 1930s, smugglers would travel to Nassau for scotch whiskey imported from Great Britain. This became a major industry for Nassau, so the city suffered a considerable setback when Prohibition ended in 1934.

During the nineteenth century and into the time of Prohibition, the islands began to attract affluent American tourists. Because of this, the supporting hospitality industries grew, as did banking and commerce. In 1961, when Cuba became closed to American tourists, attentions were again focused on the Bahamas. The Nassau Harbor was dredged and redesigned to accommodate more large-scale cruise ships, and a bridge was built connecting Nassau to nearby Paradise Island.

In 1964 Great Britain gave the Bahamas the rights to limited self-government. In 1969 the colony was granted status as a commonwealth. The nation gained complete independence in 1973 and officially became the Commonwealth of the Islands of the Bahamas, a parliamentary monarchy that recognizes the British head of state. Throughout colonization and into independence, Nassau remained the capital of the island nation.

In the late 2010s and early 2020s, crime in the capital, from nonviolent thefts to sexual assaults, was increasing. In early 2019, the US State Department issued a travel advisory warning tourists away from areas of Nassau where violent crime had become prevalent. In late January 2024, the department issued another warning in response to eighteen murders that had occurred in Nassau in just the first twenty-four days of the new year.

Hurricane Dorian, the strongest to make landfall in the Bahamas in recorded history, pummeled parts of the country on September 1–3, 2019. The slow-moving category-5 storm killed at least sixty-one people and wrought severe damage to Great Abaco and Grand Bahama Islands. Nassau served as the center of rescue and disaster-relief operations, and some forty-eight hundred evacuees sought shelter and medical care there in the storm's aftermath. Shelters there were strained to capacity, housing two thousand people at their peak. There were reports of discrimination against Haitian nationals, and 112 Haitians were deported in early October. Meanwhile, high rates of trip cancellations threatened the economies of Nassau and other unaffected areas of the tourism-dependent country.

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