The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. Columbia Encyclopedia World Factbook American Heritage Coll. The second largest Texas city, after Houston, Dallas is a commercial, industrial, and financial center. Its manufactures include aerospace equipment, cotton-processing machinery, textiles, chemicals, and leather goods, as well as aircraft, automobiles, and other transportation equipment.
Oil is refined, and there are meatpacking plants.
Its banks and insurance company headquarters make Dallas the Southwest's center for those industries. Publishing and printing are also important. The city was named in 1846 after Vice President George M. Dallas . Developing as a cotton market in the 1870s, Dallas later became known as a center for retail stores, including Neiman-Marcus Co., which was founded in 1907. President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas on Nov. 22, 1963.