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HISTORY
The San Joaquin River flows through the heart of the county's fertile flatland, bounded on the west by the Diablo Range and on the east by the Sierra foothills. The San Joaquin joins the Sacramento and Mokelumne rivers to create myriad waterways in the Delta, a magnet for house boaters and anglers. A deep-water channel meanders from San Francisco Bay to Stockton, the county seat, creating a major "seaport" almost 80 miles from the ocean. Giant freighters ply the channel and carry California agricultural products worldwide. Major San Joaquin County crops include corn, tomatoes, asparagus, dry beans. sweet cherries, apricots, walnuts, table grapes, and wine grapes,
San Joaquin
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Spanish Army Lieutenant Gabriel Moraga was the first European to explore what is now the interior valley of California. His journey left an indelible mark on the state, giving Moraga the liberty of naming most major rivers and landmarks. He and his explorers were astonished upon first entering the valley. They noted the great wealth of wildlife that they could view for as far as the eye could see. Everywhere they looked there were ducks, geese, cranes, herons, pelicans, curlew, antelope, deer, elk and grizzly bears all living their lives undisturbed. Prior to their visit only the local Indians had ventured into the area.
In 1808, Gabriel Moraga ventured in to the central valley from the coastal mission at San Jose to find more potential sites for new Spanish Missions and pursue Indians that had fled from San Jose. According to written history, Moraga was the first non-native explorer to enter what is now the San Joaquin Valley.
During his trek, he named a small creek after Saint Joachim, who was the father of Mary, the Virgin mother of Jesus Christ. "Saint Joachim" translates, in Spanish, to "San Joaquin". It was later discovered that the creek fed in to a larger river, which then took on the same name. Being the major tributary through the valley, the name of the river soon propagated to the entire central Valley, becoming known as the San Joaquin Valley.
In 1850, California named the county that bordered the river as "San Joaquin County".
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Copyright ©2010 Colleen Norby. All rights reserved.
This web page is maintained on behalf of the California portion of The USGenWeb Project. Although believed to be correct as presented, if you note any corrections, changes, additions, or find that any links provided on this page are not functioning properly, please contact Colleen Norby Last updated on 12/31/2009 .
