Pasadena California History

The Pasadena area's original inhabitants were members of the Tongva tribe.

Much of the land that is now Pasadena, Altadena and South Pasadena was a Spanish land grant to Eulalia Perez de Guille, a cook and housekeeper at San Gabriel Mission. The grant was named Rancho San Pascual because it was deeded on Easter Sunday. By the time California became part of the United States in 1848, Manuel Garfias owned Rancho San Pascual, selling parts of it to white settlers entering the area.

In 1873, Dr. Daniel M. Berry of Indiana became interested in the area for the relief it offered him from asthma. He bought a tract of land and brought some of his respiratory patients here, forming the Indiana Colony in 1874 and creating the California Orange and Citrus Growers Association to raise money for his venture.

When the residents of the Indiana Colony wanted to get their own post office, the Postmaster General insisted that they find a more suitable name. Dr. Thomas Elliott proposed several names based on the Minnesota Chippewa Indian words for "Crown of the Valley," "Key of the Valley," "Valley of the Valley," and "Hill of the Valley." All of the phrases ended in pa-sa-de-na (of the valley), and the residents chose this pleasant-sounding name for their community. In 1886, Pasadena became the second incorporated municipality in Southern California, after Los Angeles.

Pasadena became an important stop on the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway, and it experienced a real estate boom the lasted from the 1880s until the Great Depression, a period when many tourist hotels were built and the city became a winter resort for wealthy Easterners.