[13] The city provides the population with access to over 30 parks and trails, a senior center, and many cultural events such as the Northwest Art & Air Festival, River Rhythms, Summer Sounds and Movies at Monteith.

In addition to farming and manufacturing, the city's economy depends on retail trade, health care, and social assistance.

[15][16] In the historical era, the area of the Willamette Valley that makes up modern-day Albany was inhabited by one of the tribes of the Kalapuya,[17][18] a Penutian-speaking,[19] Native American people.

[20] The Kalapuya had named the area Takenah,[1] a Kalapuyan word used to describe the deep pool at the confluence of the Calapooia and Willamette rivers.

The Kalapuya population in the valley was between 4,000 and 20,000 before contact with Europeans, but they suffered high mortality from new infectious diseases introduced shortly afterward.

[22] That, coupled with the treaties signed during the 1850s by the Kalapuya to cede land to the United States, left the area nearly free for European Americans to settle.

Taking up a land claim for himself, Hackleman asked Hiram N. Smead to hold another for him until his son arrived from Iowa.

[23] In 1847 a pair of brothers, Walter and Thomas Monteith, settled in the area, after traveling by ox team along the Oregon Trail[24] from their native state of New York.

Residents in the Monteiths' portion of town were mainly Yankee merchants and professionals from the Upper Midwest and New England, who aligned with the Republican Party.

The residents in Hackleman's portion of town to the east were made up mostly of working-class Democrats from the Upland South/Lower Midwest who were split between supporting the Union and the Confederacy.

In 1851, Albany was designated as the county seat, replacing Calapooia (near modern-day Brownsville and Sweet Home),[29] and all court meetings were held there.

[1] Though Takenah meant "deep pool," in reference to the confluence of the Calapooia and Willamette rivers, it was commonly translated as "Hole in the Ground".

[35] In 1916 Kuo-Ching Li, a Chinese-American engineer, founded Wah Chang Trading Corporation in New York State, but it was based in Albany.

First known as the Northwest Electro-development Facility, the site eventually produced titanium and zirconium, spearheaded by William Justin Kroll whom the bureau hired in 1945.

[37] In the 1970s, Albany attempted to extend its city limits to include a zirconium processing plant of Wah Chang Corporation in order to increase its industrial tax base.

[41] Albany has generally warm and dry summers during which precipitation drops to 0.4 inches (10 mm) in July and temperatures peak at an average of 80.8 °F (27 °C) in August.

[55] In total the local government employs around 450 full- and part-time employees with the majority in Police, Fire, and Public Works Operations.

[65] The decline of the timber industry and the outsourcing of manufacturing jobs has left Linn County with a relatively high unemployment rate.

Oregon Freeze Dry is a leading employer in the manufacturing sector of the Albany economy with its headquarters located in the city.

The Albany facility is the company's main research and development site in the industry,[68] and has recently partnered with Seattle-based technology company EnerG2 to produce carbon electrode material, in a 74,000-square-foot (6,900 m2) former distribution center of Oregon Freeze Dry by 2011 bringing a new green technology industry to Albany.

The construction of a regional shopping center had been planned for a decade and included proposals to build a rival mall in Corvallis.

It has been relocated twice, most recently to downtown Albany, where is serves as the Monteith House Museum and is on the National Register of Historic Places.

[90] The department also has an urban forestry program which involves the Legacy Forest at Lexington Park, that consists of commemorative tree planting designed to perpetuate the memory or work of individuals and organizations.

LBCC offers 47 areas of study and programs,[100] serves over 18,000 full- and part-time students[101] and is supported financially through tuition, property taxes and the State of Oregon.

[110] The primary media outlet is the daily newspaper Albany Democrat-Herald[111] which is owned and published by Lee Enterprises.

In 1998, the airport became the first airport in Oregon to be named to the National Register of Historic Places, and was the City of Albany's fourth National Historic District,[121] It held its first air show in 1931 and has been home to exhibits, helicopter rides and Young Eagles flights for children as part of the annual Northwest Art & Air Festival.

Long-haul train route the Coast Starlight[127] (with service from Los Angeles to Seattle) stops in Albany daily in both directions.

Amtrak Cascades commuter trains operate between Vancouver, British Columbia and Eugene, Oregon, and serve Albany several times daily in each direction.

[citation needed] Beginning in 2004, the station and the surrounding area underwent an $11.3 million restoration that was funded with a combination of federal, state, local, and Amtrak money.

It is a flat bicycle and pedestrian path that runs along Periwinkle Creek from the northwest corner of Grand Prairie Park to the Albany Boys and Girls Club, and travels a round trip distance of 3.61 miles (5.81 km).