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Sacramento travel guide

about Sacramento

Sacramento is the county seat of Sacramento County, California and the capital of the U.S. state of California. It was founded in December 1848 by John Sutter Jr.. Sacramento was an outgrowth of Sutter's Fort which was established by his father Captain John Sutter in 1839. During the gold rush Sacramento was a major distribution point, a commercial and agricultural center, and terminus for wagon train, stagecoach, riverboat, telegraph, Pony Express, and the First Transcontinental Railroad.

Sacramento geography

According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 257.0 km² (99.2 mi²). 251.6 km² (97.2 mi²) of it is land and 5.4 km² (2.1 mi²) of it is water;2.1% of the area is water. The population in 2000 was 407,018; the 1980 population was 275,741. The city's current estimated popultion is around 418,000.

The City is located at the confluence of the Sacramento River and the American River, and is a deepwater port via a channel to Suisun Bay and San Francisco. It is the shipping, rail, processing, and marketing center for the Sacramento Valley, where fruit, vegetables, rice, wheat, and dairy goods are produced, cattle are raised, and food processing is a major industry.

Much of the land to the west of the City is reserved for a flood control basin. As a result, the greater metropolitan area sprawls only four miles west of downtown but 20 miles northeast and east, into the Sierra Nevada foothills.

Sacramento is located around 85 miles northeast of San Francisco on Interstate 80 and 135 miles southwest of Reno, Nevada on Interstate 80; It is 385 miles north of Los Angeles on Interstate 5.

A commuter rail service, Amtrak's Capitol Corridor, links Sacramento to the San Francisco Bay Area. Amtrak's California Zephyr transcontinental rail service also calls at the city.

The Sacramento International Airport handles flights coming from and going to various United States destinations (including Hawai'i) and to/from Mexico.

Sacramento history

Past and Present Mayors

The Lost Frontier

Miwok, Shonommey and Maidu Indians lived in this area for perhaps thousands of years. Unlike the settlers that would eventually make Sacramento their home, these Indians would leave little evidence of their existence. Their diet was dominated with acorns taken from the plentiful oak trees in the region and by eating fruits, bulbs, seeds, and roots throughout the year.

The Spanish explorer Gabriel Moraga discovered and named the Sacramento Valley and the Sacramento River after the Spanish term for "holy sacrament", in either 1806 or 1808.

From Pioneers to Gold Fever

The pioneer John Sutter arrived from Liestal, Switzerland in the Sacramento area with other settlers in August, 1839 and established the trading colony Sutter's Fort (also called New Helvetia) in 1840. Gold was subsequently discovered in Sutter's Mill (located in nearby Coloma) in 1848, leading to a large increase in population as gold-seekers came to the area. John Sutter Jr. then planned the City of Sacramento, against the wishes of his father, naming the city after the Sacramento River for commercial reasons. He hired topographical engineer William H. Warner to draft the official layout of the city. However, a bitterness grew between the elder Sutter and his son as Sacramento became an overnight commercial success (Sutter's Fort, Mill and the town of Sutterville, that were all founded by John Sutter Sr., would eventually fail).

The part of Sacramento originally laid out by William Warner is situated just east and south of where the American River meets the Sacramento River (though over time it has grown to extend significantly north, south, and east of there). A number of directly adjacent towns or cities enlarge the overall greater Sacramento area to a much larger size.

The citizens of Sacramento adopted a city charter in 1849, which was recognized by the state legislature in 1850. Sacramento is the oldest incorporated city in California. During the early 1850's the Sacramento valley was devastated by floods, fires and from cholera epidemics. Despite this, because of its position just downstream from the Mother Lode in the Sierra Nevada, the newfound city grew, quickly reaching a population of 10,000.

After a few years of wandering throughout the State, the California Legislature named Sacramento as the permanent home of the State Capital in 1854. Built to be reminiscent of the U.S. Capitol in Washington D.C., this Renaissance Revival style granite building was not completed until 1874. With its newfound status and strategic location, Sacramento quickly prospered and became the western end of the Pony Express, and later the First Transcontinental Railroad (which began construction in Sacramento in 1863 and was financed by the "Big Four" - Mark Hopkins, Charles Crocker, Collis P. Huntington and Leland Stanford).

The same rivers that earlier brought death and destruction began to provide increasing levels of transportation and commerce. Both the American and especially Sacramento rivers would be key elements in economic success of the city. In fact, Sacramento effectively controlled commerce on these rivers, and public works projects were funded though taxes levied on goods unloaded from boats and loaded onto rail cars in the historic Sacramento Rail Yards.

Sacramentans raised the level of the city by landfill. The previous first floors of buildings became the basements, in an effort to control the flooding. Now both rivers are used extensively for watersports. The American River is off limits to boats and has become an international attraction for rafters. The Sacramento River sees many boaters, who can make day trips to nearby sloughs or go all along the Delta to the Bay Area and San Francisco. The 'Delta King' , which for a long time lay on the bottom of the river, was refurbished and is now a popular hotel and restaurant.

The Modern Era

Sacramento became a port (79 nautical miles northeast of San Francisco) when a schooner loaded with iron and steel arrived at the wharf in downtown Sacramento. Ships bringing mining tools and equipment, to Sacramento and its nearby gold fields enabled the river port to prosper.

Major Paul Norboe, assistant state engineer for California, saw Sacramento's potential as a port in 1916, and he campaigned for a deeper harbor. Norboe's efforts convinced the state and the Sacramento Chamber of Commerce to make a feasibility study for a deep-water channel and harbor. At the end of World War II, Mr. William G. 'Bill' Stone (later considered "The Father of the Port of Sacramento") convinced the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers to restudy the deep-water project. The Corps' study proposed a 43-mile channel cut to Lake Washington in Yolo County, in what is now the City of West Sacramento. The channel would begin at the Sacramento River near Rio Vista, California.

The U.S. Congress authorized the Sacramento port construction project in July 1946, signed by President Harry S. Truman. Roy Deary, president of the Sacramento Chamber of Commerce, appointed a port district organization committee, with meetings held with the County and the City. The Sacramento-Yolo Port District was created in 1947, with the ground breaking ceremony in 1949.

The first major storage facility at the port was a 500,000 bushel (18,000 m³) capacity grain elevator. This was later expanded to 875,000 bushels (31,000 cubic meters) and received its first truck shipments of wheat in 1950. On June 29th, 1963, with 5,000 spectators waiting to welcome her, the Motor Vessel Taipei Victory arrived. The Port was open for business. The Nationalist Chinese flag ship, freshly painted for the historic event, was loaded with 5,000 tons of bagged rice for Mitsui Trading Co. Its destination was Okinawa. Carried on deck were 1,000 tons of logs for Japan. She was the first ocean-going vessel in Sacramento since the steamship Harpoon in 1934.

The city's current charter was adopted by voters in 1920, establishing a city council and city manager form of government, still used today.

The city of North Sacramento incorporated in 1924, and merged into the city of Sacramento in 1964.

The current mayor is Heather Fargo. The city hosts two professional basketball teams, the Sacramento Kings (NBA), and the Sacramento Monarchs (WNBA). In addition, Sacramento also has a minor league baseball team called the Sacramento River Cats (affiliate of the Oakland Athletics).

The California State Fair is held in Sacramento in the latter weeks of the summer (ending on Labor Day). Over one million people attended this state fair in 2001.

Sacramento is also home to California State University at Sacramento, founded as the Sacramento State College in 1947, with a 2000 enrollment of around 27,000. The Los Rios Community College District hosts several 2-year colleges- American River College, Consumnes River College, Sacramento City College, Folsom Lake College, plus a large number of outreach centers for those colleges.

The primary newspaper is the Sacramento Bee (www.sacbee.com), founded in 1857. Its rival, The Sacramento Union started publishing six years earlier, in 1851. Before it closed its doors in 1994, it was the oldest daily newspaper west of the Mississippi. The Union also had a familiar reporter -- Mark Twain, who worked at the Union in 1866.

The oldest part of the town, other than Sutter's Fort, lies on J to L Streets between the Sacramento River and Interstate 5, and is now known as Old Sacramento. It forms the Old Sacramento State Historic Park. Many buildings from the 1860s on have been either preserved, restored or reconstructed, and the district is now a substantial tourist attraction, with rides on steam-hauled historic trains and paddle steamers available.

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This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Sacramento, California".

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