San Diego

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SAN DIEGO

SAN DIEGO. Located in Southern California near the border with Mexico, San Diego boasts a pleasant, temperate climate and a magnificent natural harbor that has made the city a center of international commerce, a major U.S. naval base, and a popular destination for tourists. As of the 2000 Census, the city was home to some 1,223,400 people, making it the second largest city in California and the seventh largest in the United States.

The region was originally densely inhabited by Native American peoples, including the Cahuilla and the Kumeyaay. Europeans first came in 1542, when the Spanish explorer Juan Cabrillo landed there. He was followed in 1602 by Sebastián Vizcaíno, who gave San Diego its name. In 1769, when Spain finally decided to settle Alta California, San Diego became the site of the first European

settlement. San Diego was incorporated as a city in 1850, following the American conquest. With the establishment of a connection to the Santa Fe Railroad in 1884, the city's population began to grow, but it remained in the shadow of Los Angeles, which had become the economic and demographic center of Southern California. Throughout the late nineteenth century, its economy remained rooted in agriculture, cattle ranching, and fishing.

In many ways the turning point for the city came in 1915, with the Panama-California Exposition. Designed to celebrate the opening of the Panama Canal, the Exposition also served to advertise the city's attractive climate, spurring tourism and settlement. A modest menagerie created as part of the celebration would become a permanent attraction, eventually blossoming into the world famous San Diego Zoo. In the late 1910s and early 1920s the city benefited from a growing military presence with the creation of naval and marine training centers and the designation of San Diego as the home port for the Eleventh Naval District.

During World War II the region's military facilities were hugely expanded to include a major new marine training center at Camp Pendleton, to the north of the city, and Miramar Naval Air Station. Equally important were wartime orders for aircraft that boosted the fortunes of several local companies, including Ryan Aeronautical and Consolidated Aircraft. In the postwar years, Cold War tensions sustained the region's military bases and fueled the federal government's orders for aircraft and sophisticated electronics. The establishment of the John Day Hopkins Laboratory and the U.S. Naval Electronics Laboratory helped provide the infrastructure to support the aerospace and high-technology industries. The University of California at San Diego, which opened in 1964 in the La Jolla section of the city, also quickly gained a reputation as a superior educational institution and a center for scientific research. In close proximity to the university were located the Salk Institute for Biological Studies, founded in 1960, and the Scripps Institute of

Oceanography, a famous aquatic research station established in 1903.

Although military spending provided the most important component of postwar growth, the city benefited as well from growing commercial ties with Asia and Latin America and a tuna fishing industry that by 1950 featured a fleet of some two-hundred ships and six canneries. By 1960 overseas competition had seriously eroded San Diego's significance as a fishing port, but a growing tourist trade helped to offset this. For decades the city's attractive climate and wide beaches had lured visitors, but during the 1960s concerted efforts were made to boost further the city's appeal, including the 1964 opening of Sea World, an amusement park with an aquatic theme; the revitalization of historic Old Town San Diego; and the unveiling of the San Diego Wild Animal Park in 1972. Since the late 1980s, cutbacks in defense spending have had an impact on the city's growth, but this has been moderated by the region's economic diversification, including a strong tourist industry and the city's strategic commercial location on the Pacific Rim.