Hartford serves as the state capital for Connecticut and ranks as America’s 29th-most highly populated state capital city. The name Hartford was patterned after a British town called Hertford back in 1637.

Nicknames for Hartford include New England’s Rising Star and The Insurance Capital of the World. The official moniker for Connecticut is The Constitution State while other nicknames are The Nutmeg State, The Provisions State and The Land of Steady Habits.

Established in 1635, Hartford is one of America’s oldest cities. Connecticut’s capital is home to Bushnell Park (oldest publicly funded park), Hartford Courant (longest continuously published newspaper), Wadsworth Atheneum (oldest public art museum) and Hartford Public High School (second-oldest secondary school).

Mark Twain House in Hartford is where Twain wrote his greatest literary works.

Situated on Hartford’s Farmington Avenue, its Aetna building is the biggest colonial revival building on the planet.

The Cathedral of St. Joseph in Hartford boasts the world’s largest ceramic-tile mural of Christ in Glory.

Research website numbeo ranks Hartford in the bottom 45% compared to the 250 cities evaluated on its overall quality of life index at June 2020. Hartford scored poorly on index factors such as cost of living (most expensive 9%), safety (bottom 15%) and traffic commute time (slowest 49%). On the positive side, Hartford rates relatively well for property price to income ratio (lowest 5%) and pollution (cleanest 45%).

One interesting piece of trivia is that Hartford was where American Deepika Ravichandran set a Guinness World Record by finishing a special-challenge Hasbro puzzle in 13 minutes 7 seconds at Hartford’s University High School of Science and Engineering on June 9, 2014.

Connecticut’s capital city serves as headquarters for five large corporations recognized as belonging to the Forbes Global 2000 world’s biggest companies. These major businesses include insurance behemoths Aetna, Travelers, Hartford Financial Services and the Phoenix Companies as well as Northeast Utilities.

From an international trade perspective, Connecticut exported US$16.243 billion worth of goods around the globe in 2019. Its most valuable exports include civilian aircraft including engines and other parts (36.8% of Connecticut’s global total), semiconductors-making machinery (3%), turbojet or turbopropeller parts (1.5%), drugs and medicines (1%), piping taps and valves (0.9%), gas turbine parts (0.8%), miscellaneous refrigerating or freezing equipment (also 0.8%), airplane or helicopter parts (0.7%), physical or chemical instruments and apparatus (0.7%), and disodium carbonate (also 0.7%) according to United States Census Bureau data.

The non-seasonally adjusted unemployment rate for Hartford County was 10.7% at July 2020, up from 4.1% one year earlier.

Capital Facts for Hartford, United States: Quick Reference

 
Hartfordites celebrate Independence Day as a national holiday each July 4.

Hartford’s land area occupies 17.38 square miles (45.01 square kilometers). The state capital’s population was 121,033 Hartfordites at September 22, 2020.

At the state level, Connecticut’s land area measures 4,849 square miles (12,559 square kilometers) home to a population of 3.6 million people.

Hartford’s population density is more concentrated averaging 6,964 residents per square mile (2,689 per square kilometer).

Zooming out to Connecticut state’s land boundaries, population density dilutes to an average 735 inhabitants per square mile (284 per square kilometer).