Aurora is the 112th largest city in the USA and also the 2nd most heavily populated city in Illinois. It is a suburb of the city of Chicago and is situated 64 km or 40 miles west of "the Loop." According to records, during the year 2010 the population was around 197,900. The city of Aurora was first founded within Kane County. Over the past 50 years, the city limits have greatly expanded and now they spill over into DuPage, Kendal and Will Counties. Kendall County was considered to be the fastest growing county within the United States in the year 2010.
New York natives Joseph and Samuel McCarty established the city of Aurora during the year 1837. Originally the settlement was known as McCarty Mills. When it merged together with the neighboring city of West Aurora during 1857, the two communities merged as one. Nicknamed the "City of Lights," the city of Aurora became the first city within the USA to make use of electric lights in 1881 for lighting all of the roads in the city.
During a portion of the early 1900s, the city was home to 6 different car businesses. Eventually, these automobile businesses eventually folded. A strong part of the economy of the city has been manufacturing and this was an essential business in years of both WWI and WWII and the Depression. During the 1970s and 1980s, several factories began closing, forcing the city of Aurora to explore alternate sources of revenue.
Aurora welcomed a riverboat casino into the city's downtown core area and development around neighboring residential communities and likewise the casino began to flourish. The Hollywood Casino is a dockside gaming facility with 1200 gaming options inside a 53,000 square foot building. As its namesake, the casino houses the original memorabilia from movies such as The FBI Story, Wayne's World The Blues Brothers, Misery, Titanic and The Natural among others.
The downtown core of Aurora is situated on the picturesque Fox River. A large-scale redevelopment plan started in 2011 to be able to renovate the underdeveloped Stolp Island business district. Along the Fox River there are plans to build about 6000 housing units.
This area comprises one of the most notable architectural collections in the Midwest. Aurora features structures by Bruce Goff, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Frank Lloyd Wright and George Grant Elmslie.
The city of Aurora is located on the edge of the Illinois Technology and Research Corridor. The city of Aurora shares a long tradition of manufacturing that is also abundant in the Chicago metropolitan. Among the main manufacturers who have occupied the area include: Barber Greene Ltd, Lyon Workspace Products, the Aurora Silverplate Manufacturing Company, the Chicago Corset Company, Western Wheeled Scraper Works that eventually became Austin-Western Inc, Caterpillar Inc., National Metalwares, Allsteel Metals and the Aurora Brewing Company. The most famous employer and industry was the Chicago Burlington and Quincy Railroad, this eventually became Burlington Northern and they held their head office within Aurora.