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is a city in Volusia County, Florida, United States. The population was 20,048 according to the 2000 census. As of 2007, the population recorded by the U.S. Census Bureau is 23,161.
The area was first settled in 1768, when Scottish physician Dr. Andrew Turnbull established the colony of "New Smyrna." The colony occupies a notable place in history by being the single largest attempt by a member of the British Crown at colonization in the New World. Turnbull transplanted around 1500 settlers (many of them Greek), from Smyrna, Crete, Mani Peninsula, Sicily, Majorca, Ibiza, and Minorca to grow hemp, sugarcane, indigo, and to produce rum. The colony suffered major losses due to insect-borne diseases and Native American raids; and tensions grew due to mistreatment by Turnbull. Due to these complications, the remaining colonists marched north to St. Augustine along the Old King's Highway, to claim mistreatment by Turnbull to the Governor of Florida in St. Augustine in 1777; then a British protectorate. Soon after, St. Augustine was returned to the Spanish, and Turnbull abandoned his colony for life in Charleston, South Carolina.
The area then only maintained sparse populations due to Seminole raids until after the American Civil War in the 1860s, during which its still-standing "Stone Wharf" was shelled by Union gunboats. In 1887 the Town of New Smyrna was incorporated with a population of 150. In 1892, the arrival of Henry Flagler's Florida East Coast Railway lead to an increase in the area's economy, which was based on the tourism, citrus, and commercial fishing industries.
During prohibition in the 1920s, the city and its river islands were popular still sites and hideouts for rumrunners coming in from the Bahamas through Mosquito Inlet, now Ponce de León Inlet. "New Smyrna", became "New Smyrna Beach" in 1947, when the city annexed the seaside community of Coronado Beach. Today, it is a bustling resort town of over 20,000 permanent residents, with over 1,000,000 visitors annually.
Not unlike its Spanish partner to the north, St. Augustine, New Smyrna has stood under four flags. First the British, then the Spanish, and finally the American flag in 1845, followed by the Confederate Jack, and replaced again by the stars and stripes.
On July 4, 1995 New Smyrna was home to the death of famous painter and philanthropist, Bob Ross.