<P> In 1840 William Burke Belknap the elder (1811--1884) started the Belknap Hardware and Manufacturing Company on the banks of the Ohio River . </P> <P> In 1848, Zachary Taylor, resident of Jefferson County from childhood through early adulthood and a hero of the Mexican--American War, was elected as the 12th President of the United States . He served only sixteen months in office before dying in 1850 from acute gastroenteritis . He was buried in the east end of Louisville at Zachary Taylor National Cemetery . </P> <P> Following the 1850 Census, Louisville was reported as the nation's tenth largest city, while Kentucky was reported as the eighth most populous state . </P> <P> The Louisville and Nashville Railroad (L&N) Company was founded in 1850 by James Guthrie, who also was involved in the founding of the University of Louisville . When the railroad was completed in 1859, Louisville's strategic location at the Falls of the Ohio became central to the city's development and importance in the rail and water freight transportation business . </P>

The only true city that exhibited an urban lifestyle in kentucky in the late 1800s was