Calcasieu Parish, Louisiana

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Calcasieu Parish, Louisiana
Parish
Parish of Calcasieu
Calcasieu Parish District Courthouse
Location within the U.S. state of Louisiana
Louisiana's location within the U.S.
Country	United States
State	Louisiana
Region	Acadiana
Founded	March 24, 1840
Named for	Atakapa word for crying eagle
Parish seat (and largest city)	Lake Charles
Area
• Total	2,830 km2 (1,094 sq mi)
• Land	2,760 km2 (1,064 sq mi)
• Water	80 km2 (31 sq mi)  2.8%
Population  (2020)
• Total	216,785
• Rank	LA: 7th
• Density	77/km2 (200/sq mi)
Time zone	UTC-6 (CST)
• Summer (DST)	UTC-5 (CDT)
Congressional district	3rd
Website	Calcasieu Parish Police Jury

Calcasieu Parish (/ˈkælkəˌʃuː/; French: Paroisse de Calcasieu) is a parish located on the southwestern border of the U.S. state of Louisiana. As of the 2020 census, the population was 216,785.^[1] The parish seat is Lake Charles.^[2]

Calcasieu Parish is part of the Lake Charles metropolitan statistical area; it is also located near the Beaumont–Port Arthur (Texas), Lafayette, and Alexandria metropolitan areas.

Calcasieu Parish was created March 24, 1840, from the parish of Saint Landry, one of the original nineteen civil parishes established by the Louisiana Legislature in 1807 after the United States acquired the territory in the Louisiana Purchase of 1803.^[3] The original parish seat was Comasaque Bluff, a settlement east of the river and later called Marsh Bayou Bluff. On December 8, 1840, it was renamed as Marion, Louisiana.

In 1852 Jacob Ryan, a local planter and businessman, donated land and offered to move the courthouse in order to have the parish seat moved to Lake Charles. As the population in this area grew over the years, the original Calcasieu Parish has since been divided into five smaller parishes. The original area of Calcasieu Parish is called Imperial Calcasieu.