The Philadelphia Portal

The Philadelphia skyline from the South Street Bridge, January 2020

Philadelphia, commonly referred to as Philly, is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the sixth-most populous city in the nation, with a population of 1,603,797 in the 2020 census. The city is the urban core of the larger Delaware Valley, also known as the Philadelphia metropolitan area, the nation's seventh-largest and one of the world's largest metropolitan regions with 6.245 million residents in its metropolitan statistical area and 7.366 million residents in its combined statistical area.

With 18 four-year universities and colleges, Philadelphia is one of the nation's leading centers for higher education and academic research. , the Philadelphia metropolitan area was the state's largest and nation's ninth-largest metropolitan economy with a gross metropolitan product of US$444.1 billion. The city is home to five Fortune 500 corporate headquarters as of 2022. As of 2023, metropolitan Philadelphia ranks among the top five U.S. venture capital centers, facilitated by its proximity to New York City's entrepreneurial and financial ecosystems. The Philadelphia Stock Exchange, owned by Nasdaq since 2008, is the nation's oldest stock exchange and a global leader in options trading. 30th Street Station, the city's primary rail station, is the third-busiest Amtrak hub in the nation, and the city's multimodal transport and logistics infrastructure also includes Philadelphia International Airport and the rapidly-growing PhilaPort seaport. (Full article...)

Rocky is a 1976 film written by and starring Sylvester Stallone and directed by John G. Avildsen. It tells the rags-to-riches American Dream story of Rocky Balboa, an uneducated but good-hearted debt collector for a loan shark in Philadelphia. Balboa is also a club fighter who gets a shot at the world heavyweight championship when the scheduled contender breaks his hand. Also starring are Talia Shire as Adrian, Burt Young as Adrian's brother Paulie, Burgess Meredith as Rocky's trainer Mickey Goldmill, and Carl Weathers as champion Apollo Creed. The film, made for only US$1.2 million and shot in just 28 days, was a sleeper hit; it made over US$117.2 million, won three Oscars, including Best Picture, to good reviews, and launched Stallone's career into the stratosphere. The film spawned five sequels, Rocky II, III, IV, V, and Rocky Balboa.

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South 9th Street at Montrose Street in the Italian Market. Frank Rizzo, a mayor from the 1970s, is depicted in the mural.

The Italian Market is the popular name for the South 9th Street Curb Market, an area of Philadelphia featuring many grocery shops, cafes, restaurants, bakeries, cheese shops, butcher shops, etc., many with an Italian influence. It is generally considered to extend along 9th Street from Fitzwater Street at the north to Wharton Street at the south. The term Italian Market is also used to describe the surrounding neighborhood that's nestled between South Street to the North and Wharton Street to the South running a few blocks to the east and west of 9th street.

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Wilton Norman "Wilt" Chamberlain
Wilton Norman "Wilt" Chamberlain

Wilt Chamberlain was an American professional NBA basketball player for the Philadelphia/San Francisco Warriors, the Philadelphia 76ers and the Los Angeles Lakers; and also played for the Harlem Globetrotters. The 7 foot 1 inch Chamberlain, who weighed 250 lbs as a rookie before bulking up to 275 lb and eventually over 300 lb with the Lakers, played the center position and is considered by his contemporaries as one of the greatest and most dominant players in the history of the NBA. Chamberlain holds numerous official NBA all-time records, setting records in many scoring, rebounding and durability categories. Among other notable accomplishments, he is the only player in NBA history to average more than 40 and 50 points in a season or score 100 points in a single NBA game. He also won seven scoring, nine field goal percentage, and eleven rebounding titles, and once even led the league in assists. Although suffering a long string of professional losses, Chamberlain had a successful career, winning two NBA titles, earning four regular-season Most Valuable Player awards, the Rookie of the Year award, one NBA Finals MVP award, and being selected to 13 All-Star Games and ten All-NBA First and Second teams. Chamberlain was subsequently enshrined in the Basketball Hall of Fame in 1978, elected into the NBA's 35th Anniversary Team of 1980, and chosen as one of the 50 Greatest Players in NBA History of 1996. After his basketball career, Chamberlain played volleyball in the short-lived International Volleyball Association, was president of this organization and enshrined in the IVA Hall of Fame for his contributions. Chamberlain was also a successful businessman, authored several books and appeared in the movie Conan the Destroyer. He was a lifelong bachelor, but became notorious for his claim to have had sex with 20,000 women, a statement which has entered popular culture.

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"I love my fans in Philadelphia, but this is the hardest place in the world to play in. And I think it's the hardest place to play in to be a superstar."*

Allen Iverson

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