KernLife.com

All > Kern Trivia > Local History
History of Kern County
Topics: history, Kern County, timeline
Posted by admin Fri Jul 18, 2008 12:20:51 PDT
Viewed 199 times
0 responses 0 comments

1776: On April 26, Franciscan friar Francisco Garces became the first-known European to stand on the present site of Bakersfield.

1827: A 17-man expedition led by Jedediah Smith entered the southern end of the San Joaquin Valley, marking the first entry to the area by American explorers from the East.

1853: The first recorded discovery of gold in Kern County was at a rugged area of Greenhorn Gulch, about a mile northwest of the upper Kern River.

1860: Christian Bohna arrived to become the first permanent settler at what was then called Kern Island, the site of the future city of Bakersfield.

1863: Col. Thomas Baker and his family arrived at Kern Island to begin reclamation of swampland from which Bakersfield would evolve.

1865: The first large-scale cotton production was attempted by brothers Solomon and Philo Jewett at their Rio Bravo Ranch.

1866: On April 21, the state Legislature created the county of Kern with Havilah as the county seat.

1868: Leaders of the Yowlumne branch of the Yokuts tribe warned white settlers at Woilu (at what is now 16th and F streets in Bakersfield) about an impending flood and then evacuated the area. After the flood, the Yowlumne people were rarely seen in Bakersfield.

1872: The first commercial oil activity began in the old Buena Vista district.

1872: A significant earthquake, the first to be noted by the area’s white settlers, rattled the young town of Bakersfield.

1872: Col. Baker, stricken with typhoid fever, died Nov. 24.

1874: The people of Bakersfield voted to become an incorporated city.

1874: Bakersfield displaced Havilah as the county seat.

1874: On Nov. 8, the Southern Pacific Railroad reached its station at Sumner, later to be known as Kern City and eventually east Bakersfield. Bakersfield leaders were aghast, having hoped the railroad would be built through the middle of their city.

1876: Plagued by sanitation, financial and leadership problems, Bakersfield voted to unincorporate.

1889: On July 7, fire devastated 15 city blocks of Bakersfield, leaving 1,500 residents without homes.

1893: February rains swelled the Kern River and flooded much of Bakersfield.

1893: Kern County Union High School opened its doors for the first time.

1897: Alfred Harrell, 34, purchased what would become known as The Bakersfield Californian.

1898: Bakersfield incorporated again on Jan. 11 by a vote of 387-197.

1899: The Kern River oil field, later to become one of the top producing fields in the nation, was developed seven miles northeast of the city.

1903: The Kern County Board of Trade was established with Alphonse Weill as its first president.

1903: James McKinney, last of the old-fashioned bad guys, was killed in a gunbattle.

1904: Truxtun Beale, former U.S. ambassador to Spain, donated the clock tower to the city of Bakersfield in memory of his mother, Mary Edwards Beale.

1912: Yen Ming, a leading potato grower in Bakersfield, started the first school for Chinese students. Ming Avenue was later named in his honor.

1913: A 13th grade was created with the opening of Bakersfield (Junior) College. It shared the campus of Kern County Union High School, later to be designated Bakersfield High School.

1914: The Kern County Farm Bureau was established.

1920: The highway was paved from Bakersfield to the Grapevine, bringing the total number of paved miles in the county to 302.

1925: The first Kern County Fair was held.

1927: Area cotton growers formed the California Cotton Cooperative Association, known today as Bakersfield-based Calcot Ltd.

1931: Amelia Earhart stopped at Kern County Airport on a flight from Oakland to Los Angeles.

1933: The U.S. Army Air Corps began using the present site of Edwards Air Force Base for bombing and gunnery training.

1934: The first major migration of dirt farmers from the southern Plains states of Oklahoma, Texas, Arkansas and elsewhere began; by the end of the decade, the Dust Bowl exodus had swollen the population of Kern County to nearly unmanageable numbers.

1941: Sam Lynn Ball Park opened, bringing the California League and professional baseball to Bakersfield for the first time.

1942: Bakersfield’s Earl Warren was elected governor of California with 57 percent of the vote.

1943: The Naval Ordnance Test Station was established in eastern Kern County.

1948: Harry Truman defeated Thomas Dewey to win the presidency, depriving Earl Warren of the vice presidency.

1952: On the afternoon of Aug. 22, a powerful earthquake hit Bakersfield. The face of the city was changed forever.

1952: With the help of Richard Nixon, Dwight Eisenhower beat out Earl Warren for the Republican presidential nomination.

1953: Two dams on the Kern River were completed to form Isabella Lake, ending the threat of flooding in Bakersfield.

1953: Earl Warren was named 14th chief justice of the United States.

1953: Bakersfield’s first television station, KAFY-TV, beamed its signal through the Central Valley.

1956: Bakersfield College opened its hillside campus.

1956: Former Bakersfield High School star Frank Gifford, in his fifth professional season, led the New York Giants to the NFL title. Gifford, a halfback, was named the league’s most valuable player.

1962: Bakersfield Civic Auditorium opened.

1964-65: Buck Owens, Bonnie Owens, Billy Mize, Kaye Adams and Merle Haggard led a near-sweep for Bakersfield performers at the inaugural Academy of Country Music awards in Los Angeles.

1967: Valley Plaza, the city’s first major indoor shopping center, opened at Highway 99 and Ming Avenue.

1970: Bakersfield’s first four-year education institution, California State College, Bakersfield, opened.

1974: Earl Warren died on July 9, five years and 16 days after donning the black robe of chief justice for the last time and one month before his longtime nemesis, Richard Nixon, resigned the presidency.

1977: A dust storm with winds up to 200 mph caused millions of dollars in damage.

1980: Mary K. Shell, a former newspaper columnist and political activist, was elected Bakersfield’s first woman mayor.

1981: The world’s largest cotton gin began operation in Kern County.

1986: Kern River crude dropped to an all-time, post-deregulation low price of $7 per barrel on July 24. Wells were closed and workers laid off all over Kern County.

1990: Hostilities in the Persian Gulf drove the price of Kern River crude to its highest price to date, $27.50 per barrel, on Sept. 26.

1993: A devastating, valley-wide seven-year drought ended.

1993: Labor leader Cesar Chavez died.

1993: The Bakersfield Business Conference, in its ninth year, brought three former U.S. presidents (Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter and George Bush) to the same podium. A contingent of national and international media came along to see what all the fuss was about.

1994: The Fox Theater, built in 1930, reopened in Bakersfield to much celebration.

1996: Bakersfield rap-metal band Korn followed up its gold-selling first album with “Life is Peachy,” which debuted at No. 3 on the Billboard charts. On that summer’s Lollapalooza tour, Korn proved to be by far the most popular attraction.

1997: The U.S. government sold its share of the Elk Hills oil field to Occidental Petroleum.

1998: Bakersfield celebrated 100 years as a city (based on its second incorporation).

1998: Comedian Bill Cosby took the stage as Centennial Garden opened for its first show.

1999: A 3-to 6-inch blanket of snow greeted Bakersfield residents on the morning of Jan. 25. It was the biggest snowfall of the century.

2000: Skyrocketing oil prices drove the price of Kern River crude to $26.50 per barrel on March 7, the highest peacetime price since deregulation.

2000: For the first time, there was mandatory trash pickup in Kern County.

2001: Bakersfield Museum of Art opened in its new digs.

2002: Assistant District Attorney Stephen M. Tauzer was slain and found in his garage.

2002: Former Stockdale High quarterback David Carr is drafted into the NFL.

2003: Bakersfield’s housing market began to take off.

2003: A water treatment plant in the northeast was finished, giving a boost to development estimated to top 60,000 people in the Bakersfield foothills.

2004: Kern River crude topped $30 a barrel and gas prices rose to just short of $3 a gallon.

2004: After a 10-month investigation, former elementary school vice principal Vincent Brothers was arrested and charged with the July 2003 murders of his wife, mother-in-law and three children.

2005: Bakersfield’s housing market soared. Resale prices rose 41 percent in the first quarter of 2005 from the previous year. Almost every major home builder in the nation staked out a presence in the market.

2006: World-renowned country singer Buck Owens died at 77. Buck’s ex-wife Bonnie died at 76.

2006: Midway Sunset crude topped $62 a barrel and consumers paid more than $3.50 per gallon.

2006: Bakersfield’s housing market began to cool.

2006: Bakersfield’s new airport terminal, the William M. Thomas Terminal, opened.

2006: A series of three heat waves in June and July, ending with 15 consecutive triple-digit days, contributed to the deaths of 20 people, 4,000 cattle and 25,000 chickens.

2007: A weeklong January freeze destroyed half of Kern’s citrus crops and put thousands of farmworkers out of seasonal work.

2007: Former elementary school vice principal Vincent Brothers was found guilty of first degree murder for killing five family members. The jury voted for the death penalty.

2007: A remodeled International Terminal at Meadows Field began its first flights to Guadalajara, Mexico.

2007: The housing market slowdown continued. Kern County experienced triple the national rate of foreclosures.

2008: A portion of Seventh Standard Road from North Chester Avenue to Highway 99 is renamed Merle Haggard Drive.

2008: Vicente Fernandez, Mexico's most popular mariachi and ranchera singer,
performed at the Rabobank Arena at the end of May. With attendance at
10,400, it was the most crowded concert by a Spanish-language music act in
the Rabobank Arena's history.

2008: By June, more than 250 people had paid for seats on Scaled Composites' SpaceShipTwo, aiming to be the first private flight into suborbital space. Meanwhile, XCOR Aerospace, also based at the Mojave Air and Space Port, entered the space-tourism race with its rocket-powered Lynx.

Send to a Friend

Report a Violation