Klaipeda tourist information

The settlement of Baltic tribes in the territory of the present-day city is said to have existed in the region as early as the 7th century.

In the 1240s the Pope offered King Håkon IV of Norway the opportunity to conquer the peninsula of Sambia. However, following the personal acceptance of Christianity by Grand Duke Mindaugas of Lithuania, the Teutonic Knights and a group of crusaders from Lübeck moved into Sambia, founding unopposed a fort in 1252 recorded as Memele castrum (or Memelburg, "Memel Castle"). The fort's construction was completed in 1253 and Memel was garrisoned with troops of the Livonian Order administered by Deutschmeister Eberhard von Seyne. Documents for its foundation were signed by Eberhard and Bishop Heinrich von Lützelburg of Courland on July 29, 1252 and August 1, 1252.

By the beginning of the 18th century, Memel was one of the strongest fortresses (Memelfestung) in Prussia and the town became part of the Kingdom of Prussia in 1701. Despite the fortifications it was captured by Russian troops during the Seven Years' War in 1757. Consequently, from 1757–1762 the town, like the whole of eastern Prussia, was dependent on the Russian Empire. Upon war's end the maintenance of the fortress was neglected, but the town's growth continued.

With the unification of Germany as the German Empire in 1871, Memel became its most northerly city.

The development of the town in the 19th century was conditioned by the industrial revolution in Prussia and its attendant process of urbanisation. Even though the population of Memel increased fourfold during the 19th century and there were 21,470 people living in the city itself in 1910, the pace of development lagged in comparison. The reasons for this were mostly political. Memel was the northern-most and farthest eastern city of Germany and although the government was engaged in a very costly tree-planting exercise to stabilise the sand-dunes on the Curonian Spit, most national financial infusions in the province of East Prussia were concentrated on Königsberg, the capital of the province (notably the blasting of the bar, and a new ship canal between Pillau to Konigsberg, which enabled vessels of 21 foot draught to moor alongside the city - cost 13 million marks).

Under the Treaty of Versailles after World War I, Memel and the surrounding Memel Territory (or Klaipeda Region) was made a protectorate of the Entente States, in order to guarantee port rights to Lithuania and Poland. The territory was adminstered by an autonomous Landtag government, under a French High Commissioner, with the ultimate intention that it would be a self-governing territory on the model of Danzig.

During World War II, from the end of 1944 into 1945, the German inhabitants felt compelled to flee as the fighting drew nearer, or were later expelled or murdered. The city was captured by the Soviet Red Army on January 28, 1945. Unlike the rest of East Prussia, the Memel Territory was not considered part of the Soviet occupation zone, and was therefore incorporated into the Lithuanian SSR (a part of the Soviet State), marking the start of a new epoch in the history of the city.

The Soviets transformed Klaipeda, as the foremost ice-free port in the Eastern Baltic, into the largest piscatorial-marine base in the European USSR. A gigantic shipyard, a few dockyards and the fishing port were constructed. Subsequently, by the end of the 1950s the population of the city had surpassed twice its pre-war population, and by 1989 there were 203,000 people in Klaipeda. In the aftermath of World War II almost all the new inhabitants came to Klaipeda from Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, and Lithuania. Initially the Russian-speakers dominated the local government in the city, but after the death of Joseph Stalin more people came to the city from the rest of Lithuania than from other Soviet republics and oblasts; this caused Lithuanians to become the majority. Among Lithuanian cities with a population greater than 100,000, however, Klaipeda has the highest percentage of people whose native language is Russian.

Up to the 1970s Klaipeda was only important to the USSR for its economy, while cultural and religious activity was minimal and restricted. The developers of a Roman Catholic church (Maria, Queen of Peace, constructed 1957-1962) were arrested. The city began to develop cultural activities in the 1970s and 1980s, such as the introduction of the Sea Festival cultural tradition. Based on the Pedagogical University of Šiauliai and the National Conservatory of Lithuania in Klaipeda, the University of Klaipeda was established in 1991. Klaipeda also has the bilingual German-Lithuanian Hermann-Sudermann-Schule.