Sundsvall

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Sundsvall is a city in lower Norrland, central Sweden, situated in the province of Medelpad and Västernorrland County. It had 49,150 inhabitants in 2004 and is situated at 62°24′N 17°19′E. Administratively it is the seat of Sundsvall Municipality, which includes the surroundings within some 40 km (except Timrå) and had 94,339 inhabitants in june 2006.

Sundsvall was chartered in 1621, has a port by the Gulf of Bothnia, and is located 395 km north of Stockholm. The city has burned down and been rebuilt four times. The first time, in 1721, it was set on fire by the Russian army during the Great Northern War. The last fire, in 1888, was the largest in Sweden's history. It is presumed that the fire was caused by a spark from a steamship. After that fire, the city centre was rebuilt only with stone buildings. Sundsvall's centre is therefore nicknamed Stenstaden (the stone city).

Sundsvall cirka 1700, in Suecia antiqua et hodierna.

According to one historian, Swedish industrialism started in Sundsvall when the Tunadal sawmill bought a steam-engine driven saw in 1849. In the early 20th century Sundsvall was an even greater centre of forestry industry in Sweden than it is today.

The first large Swedish strike was the "Sundsvall strike" in 1879. The industrial heritage makes social democrat and socialist sympathies more prevalent in the Sundsvall region than in Sweden as a whole.

Today Sundsvall is not only dominated by the pulp and paper industry, and the aluminium production, but also by banks, insurance companies, telecommunications administration and a number of large public data processing centres such as the national social insurance board. The main campus of the newly established Mid Sweden University is also located in the city.