Baton Rouge

Baton Rouge stands on the first natural bluff above the Mississippi River north of the delta — a low rise that keeps it safely above the floods that shaped the flat country downstream. The French name, "red stick," recalls a marker that early explorers found dividing tribal hunting grounds. That bluff and the deep river channel made the site strategic, and it became the state capital in 1846.

The bluff marks the head of deep-water navigation on the Mississippi, so Baton Rouge is a major inland port where oceangoing ships still dock, lined with the refineries and petrochemical plants of the lower river. Beyond the industrial riverfront, the land flattens into the bayous and farmland of south Louisiana. State government and Louisiana State University anchor the city alongside the port.

• Louisiana
  The Pelican State, where the Mississippi meets the Gulf located in
• New Orleans
  A river-delta city largely below sea level same state