The US state of Connecticut is located in the northeastern part of the US in the New England area. The state is shares its border together with the state of Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts towards the north, and the state of New York to the south and the west. Connecticut likewise shares a water boundary along with New York in the Long Island Sound.
Connecticut's first settlers from Europe were Dutch and established a short-lived, small settlement in present-day Hartford at the confluence of the Connecticut rivers and the Park known as Huys de Goede Hoop. Originally, half of Connecticut was a part of the Dutch colony, New Netherland, which consisted of much of the land between the Delaware and Connecticut rivers.
The first major settlements were established during the 1630s by the English. Thomas Hooker led a band of followers overland from the Massachusetts Bay Colony and founded what would become the Connecticut Colony; other settlers from Massachusetts established the Saybrook Colony and the New Haven Colony. Both the New Haven and Connecticut Colonies established documents of Fundamental Orders, considered the first constitutions within North America. In the year 1662, the three colonies were merged under a royal charter, making the state of Connecticut a crown colony. This colony was amongst the Thirteen Colonies which revolted against British rule in the American Revolution.
The Connecticut River, Thames River, and ports along the Long Island Sound have given Connecticut a strong maritime tradition, that continues today. Connecticut's other traditional industry is financial services; like for example, insurance companies in Hartford and hedge funds in Fairfield County. As of the year 2010 Census, Connecticut features the highest Human Development Index (0.962), median household income and per capita income within the nation. Although Connecticut is a wealthy state by most measures, the gap in income between its urban and suburban areas is striking, with several of Connecticut's cities ranking among the nation's poorest and most dangerous.
In 2010, the gross state product was $237 billion. The per capita income of Connecticut during the year 2007 totaled $54,117, which placed it first amongst all other states. There is, nonetheless, a great disparity in incomes throughout the state of Connecticut; though New Canaan has one of the highest per capita incomes in the United States, Hartford is among the ten cities with the lowest per capita incomes within the US. As with New Haven Bridgeport and other cities within the state of Connecticut, Hartford City is surrounded by wealthier suburbs. The state's unemployment rate in the month of August 2011 was 9.0%.
With a per capita income of $85,459, the town of New Canaan is the wealthiest town within the state of Connecticut. The towns and cities of Greenwich, Darien, Westport, Wilton and Weston all have per capita incomes more than $65,000. The poorest municipality within Connecticut is Hartford, with a per capita income of $13,428 during 2000. There are several lower-income and blue-collar towns, mainly parts of towns, in the state's eastern regions.