In 1909, Fresno's first and oldest synagogue, Temple Beth Israel, was founded.įresno entered the ranks of the 100 most populous cities in the United States in 1960 with a population of 134,000. Another devastating blaze struck in 1883. The greatest of Fresno's early-day fires, in 1882, destroyed an entire block of the city. In the nineteenth century, with so much wooden construction and in the absence of sophisticated firefighting resources, fires often ravaged American frontier towns. In extreme droughts, when the reservoir shrinks, ruins of the original county seat can still be observed. When the Friant Dam was completed in 1944, the site of Millerton became inundated by the waters of Millerton Lake. Two years after the station was established, county residents voted to move the county seat from Millerton to Fresno. Helm was the largest individual sheep grower in Fresno County. By 1877, Helm made Fresno his home with a five-acre tract of land at the corner of Fresno and R streets. In 1865, William Helm brought his sheep to Fresno county, which was then a vast space of open land.
By 1931 the Fresno Traction Company operated 47 streetcars over 49 miles of track. Fresno became an incorporated city in 1885. Many Millerton residents, drawn by the convenience of the railroad and worried about flooding, moved to the new community. Soon there was a store near the station and the store grew into the town of Fresno Station, later called Fresno. In 1872, the Central Pacific Railroad established a station near Easterby's-by now a hugely productive wheat farm-for its new Southern Pacific line. Building new canals and purchasing existing ditches, Church then formed the Fresno Canal and Irrigation Company, a predecessor of the Fresno Irrigation District. Church in 1871 to create an irrigation system. Unable to grow wheat for lack of water, he hired sheep man Moses J. In 1867, Anthony "McQueen" Easterby purchased land bounded by the present Chestnut, Belmont, Clovis and California avenues, that today is called the Sunnyside district. Rebuilt on higher ground, Scottsburg was renamed Centerville. Flooding also destroyed the town of Scottsburg on the nearby Kings River that winter. The San Joaquin River flooded on December 24, 1867, inundating Millerton. It was named for the abundant ash trees (Spanish: fresno) lining the San Joaquin River. The county of Fresno was formed in 1856 after the California Gold Rush.
The first European to enter the San Joaquin Valley was Pedro Fages in 1772. The old Fresno County Courthouse, built in 1875 and demolished in 1966. Yosemite National Park is about 60 miles (100 km) to the north, Kings Canyon National Park is 60 miles (100 km) to the east, and Sequoia National Park is 75 miles (120 km) to the southeast. It lies approximately 220 miles (350 km) north of Los Angeles, 170 miles (270 km) south of the state capital, Sacramento, and 185 miles (300 km) southeast of San Francisco. Fresno is near the geographical center of California. The city has since become an economic hub of Fresno County and the San Joaquin Valley, with much of the surrounding areas in the Metropolitan Fresno region predominantly tied to large-scale agricultural production. Named for the abundant ash trees lining the San Joaquin River, Fresno was founded in 1872 as a railway station of the Central Pacific Railroad before it was incorporated in 1885. Fresno covers about 112 square miles (290 km 2) and had a population of 542,107 in 2020, making it the fifth-most populous city in California, the most populous inland city in California, and the 34th-most populous city in the nation. It is the county seat of Fresno County and the largest city in the greater Central Valley region.