| History
 Small tribes of Native Americans made their home in the Salinas area for centuries before Spanish soldiers and missionaries arrived to build a presidio at Monterey and missions at Carmel, Soledad, San Juan Bautista and the San Antonio Valley.
Under Spanish rule, settlements developed around the Central Coast’s missions, but the valley remained largely undeveloped until Mexico overthrew its Spanish rulers and began granting lands in Alta California to Mexican families.
Among the ranchos granted to settlers by the Mexican government after Mexico seceded from Spain in 1822 were Sausal and Nacional. Salinas City was born on adjoining parts of both of these ranchos after California had become part of the United States.
During the early years of the Gold Rush, James Bryant Hill purchased Rancho Nacional and became a pioneer wheat grower. In 1854 he was named postmaster of the Salinas post office, even though there was no town of that name yet.
Jacob Leese had brought Rancho Sausal for $600 in 1852, later selling 80 acres of it Elias Howe, who built an inn he called Halfway House in 1856 at the intersection of the Monterey-San Juan Bautista, Los Angeles-San Francisco stage lines.
In 1867, Alberto Trescony, who had bought the inn from Howe, sold it and 160 acres to Alanson Riker and William Jackson. Forming a partnership with cattle rancher Eugene Sherwood, they laid out a city a half-mile square.
Knowing the railroad’s importance in getting the agricultural products of the area to market, Sherwood offered Southern Pacific Railroad free acreage for right-of-way and a depot, which opened in 1872. That was the year Salinas City became the Monterey County seat. Two years later it was incorporated as a charter city.
As agricultural enterprise in the Salinas Valley moved from hides and tallow to grains, sugar beets and beans, and after World War I, to the "green gold" of lettuce, artichokes and broccoli, Salinas became one of the wealthiest cities per capita in the United States.
The Boronda Adobe History Center, located in Salinas, is the headquarters of the Monterey County Historical Society. In addition to the oldest standing adobe in the Salinas Valley, a Queen Anne style house designed by area architect William H. Weeks and the Lagunita School that Steinbeck wrote about in his story "The Red Pony" are located on the property.
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