Biohazard Cleanup Near Image Vancouver, WA

Vancouver is a city in Clark County, Washington, sitting on the north bank of the Columbia River directly across from Portland, Oregon — and it is a different, older city from Vancouver, British Columbia, in Canada.

Vancouver was founded in 1825 around Fort Vancouver, a Hudson's Bay Company fur-trading post, and HistoryLink calls it the oldest non-Indian settlement in the Pacific Northwest.

The city was incorporated on January 23, 1857, and is named for Captain George Vancouver, the British explorer who mapped the Northwest coast in 1792.

Vancouver had a population of 190,915 at the 2020 census, making it the fourth-most populous city in Washington state.

Census Bureau survey figures for 2020–2024 counted about 81,504 households in Vancouver, with an average of 2.37 persons per household.

The reconstructed Fort Vancouver is preserved today as Fort Vancouver National Historic Site, alongside the 1849 U.S. Army Vancouver Barracks and its historic Officers Row.

Downtown's Esther Short Park, established in 1853, is reputed to be the oldest public square in Washington state and one of the oldest public parks in the West.

The park is named for pioneer Esther Short, who arrived at Fort Vancouver in 1845, defended her family's land claim against the Hudson's Bay Company, and donated the park land to the young city in 1855.

Vancouver's Pearson Field is described by HistoryLink as the oldest continually operating airfield in the West.

Clark College, founded in 1933 as a private two-year junior college, is Vancouver's community college and sits on an arboretum campus in the city's Central Park area.