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Loudoun County (pronounced "LOUD-un") is located in the Commonwealth of Virginia, and is part of the Washington Metropolitan Area.

Loudoun County constitutes a part of the five million acre Northern Neck of Virginia Proprietary granted by King Charles II of England to seven noblemen in 1649. This grant, later known as the Fairfax Proprietary, lay between the Potomac and Rappahannock Rivers. Between 1653 and 1730, Westmoreland, Stafford and Prince William Counties were formed within the Proprietary, and in 1742 the remaining land was designated Fairfax County.

In 1757, by act of the Virginia House of Burgesses, Fairfax County was divided. The western portion was named Loudoun for John Campbell, Fourth Earl of Loudoun, a Scottish nobleman who served as Commander-in-Chief for all British armed forces in North America and titular Governor of Virginia from 1756 to 1759.

Leesburg has served continuously as the County Seat since 1757.

Now, the county is estimated to be home to ~300,000 people. In recent years, it has been one of the fastest-growing counties in the US. Its county seat is Leesburg. As of 2007, the town had been county seat for 249 of the last 250 years.

Loudoun and Fairfax counties have been trading places for the wealthiest county in the US in recent years, with average household incomes coming in at well over $100,000 for both counties.

Settling of the Loudoun area began between 1725 and 1730, while it was still owned by Lord Fairfax. Permanent settlers came from Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Maryland. During the same period, settlers from eastern Virginia of English Cavalier stock came to lower Loudoun and established large tobacco plantations.

During the 1720s, a number of Quakers, Germans, Irish and Scots-Irish settled west of the Catoctin mountains. Quakers formed the settlements of Waterford, Goose Creek (now Lincoln), Harmony (now Hamilton) and Union (now Unison).

From 1745 to 1760, Germans from Pennsylvania and Maryland formed the settlement at Lovettsville. After General Braddock's defeat by the French at Fort Duquesne in 1755, refugees from the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia settled in the western part of Loudoun County, south of Short Hill. Catoctin Church became the center of that settlement.

In 1774, a meeting a freeholders and other residents was held in the County Courthouse to discuss the protection of rights and liberties in North America. The group adopted the Loudoun Resolves as well as a formal protest of the Stamp Act. Later, a number of Loudoun County men fought in the Revolutionary War.

During the War of 1812, Loudoun County served briefly as a temporary refuge for the President and important state papers. The Constitution and other state papers were brought to Rokeby, near Leesburg, for safekeeping when the British burned Washington. President Madison established headquarters at Belmont, where he was the guest of Ludwell Lee.

In 1861, residents of Loudoun County were split over the issue of secession. The Quakers and most of the Germans in northern and central Loudoun opposed slavery and secession, while the landed gentry in the southern part of the county favored secession.

During the Civil War, Colonel John Mosby and his Rangers were active in Loudoun County, which was also the home of the Laurel Brigade, a famous Confederate Cavalry unit commanded by Elijah V. White of Leesburg. A national cemetery near Leesburg marks the site of the Battle of Balls Bluff, where Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., then a young Union soldier, fought in 1861.

For more than two centuries, agriculture was the dominant way of life in Loudoun County, which had a relatively constant population of about 20,000. That began to change in the early 1960s, when Dulles International Airport was built in the southeastern part of the county. The airport attracted new businesses, workers and their families to the area.

At the same time, the metropolitan Washington, D.C. area began a period of rapid growth. Major road improvements made commuting from Loudoun County much easier, attracting more and more people to the eastern part of the county. In the last three decades, the population of Loudoun County nearly quadrupled.

Today, Loudoun County is a growing, dynamic county of about 283,000 people. Loudoun is known for its beautiful scenery, rich history, healthy diversity of expanding business opportunities, comfortable neighborhoods, and high quality public services.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Loudoun County has a total area of 521 square miles (1,350 km²), of which, 520 square miles (1,346 km²) of it is land and 1 square mile (3 km²) of it (0.24%) is water. It is bounded on the North by the Potomac River; across the river are Frederick and Montgomery counties in Maryland; it is bounded on the south by Prince William and Fauquier counties, on the west by watershed of the Blue Ridge Mountains across which are Jefferson County, West Virginia and Clarke County, and on the east by Fairfax County. The Bull Run Mountains and Catoctin Mountain bisect the county. To the west of the range is the Loudoun Valley. Bisecting the Loudoun Valley from Hillsboro to the Potomac River is Short Hill Mountain.

Block numbers in the unincorporated areas of Loudoun County, with the exception of older Sterling Park and the community of CountrySide, are assigned in the following manner: on north-south streets, block numbers increase from north to south and range from 10000 to 29900; on east-west streets, block numbers increase from west to east and range from 30000 to 49900.

Transportation

Major Highways

• U.S. Route 15
• U.S. Route 50
• State Route 7
• State Route 28
• State Route 267 (Dulles Greenway)
• Loudoun County Parkway

Air

Washington Dulles International Airport lies partly within Fairfax County and provides most air service to the county. Fairfax is also served by two other airports in the Washington area, Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport and Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport.

Manassas Regional Airport, in neighboring Prince William County, is also used for regional cargo and private jet service.

Traditionally a rural county, Loudoun's population has grown dramatically since the 1980s. Having undergone heavy suburbanization since 1990, Loudoun has a full-fledged service economy. It is home to world headquarters for several Internet-related and high tech companies, including Verizon Business, Telos Corporation, Orbital Sciences Corporation, and Paxfire. Like Fairfax County's Dulles Corridor, Loudoun County has economically benefited from the existence of Washington Dulles International Airport, the majority of which is located in the county along its border with Fairfax. Loudoun does retain a strong rural economy in the western part of the county. The equine industry has an estimated revenue of $78 Million. It is home to the Morven Park International Equestrian Center which hosts national horse trials. Loudoun has 19 wineries and over 25 active farms. Loudoun has rich soil and was in the late 1800s the fourth-largest wheat producer in the U.S.

MCI, Inc. (formerly WorldCom) is headquartered in Ashburn, Loudoun County. It announced that it would move its headquarters to Ashburn in 2003. AOL had its headquarters at 22000 AOL Way in Dulles in unincorporated Loudoun County. In 2007 AOL announced that it would move its headquarters from Loudoun County to New York City; it would continue to operate its Virginia offices. Orbital Sciences Corporation has its headquarters in Dulles.

Before its dissolution, Independence Air (originally Atlantic Coast Airlines) was headquartered in Dulles. Prior to its dissolution, MAXjet Airways was headquartered on the grounds of Washington-Dulles International Airport and in Dulles.