Los Angeles

Verified Timeline

Lore & Background

The area that became Los Angeles was originally inhabited by the indigenous Tongva people and later claimed by Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo for Spain in 1542. The city was founded on September 4, 1781, under Spanish governor Felipe de Neve, on the village of Yaanga. It became a part of the First Mexican Empire in 1821 following the Mexican War of Independence. In 1848, at the end of the Mexican–American War, Los Angeles and the rest of California were purchased as part of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo and became part of the United States. Los Angeles was incorporated as a municipality on April 4, 1850, five months before California achieved statehood. The discovery of oil in the 1890s brought rapid growth to the city. The city was further expanded with the completion of the Los Angeles Aqueduct in 1913, which delivers water from Eastern California.

In Their Own Story

The history of Los Angeles is anchored by the Tongva settlement of Yaanga. In 1781, 44 settlers established a pueblo named El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Ángeles. Following Mexican independence in 1821, Governor Pío Pico made it the regional capital of Alta California. The U.S. took control after battles culminating in the Treaty of Cahuenga in 1847, and formalized by the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848. After incorporation in 1850, railroads arrived in 1876 and 1885, and oil was discovered in 1892. The Los Angeles Aqueduct, completed in 1913 under William Mulholland, secured water for the city's expansion. By 1910, Hollywood had merged with the city, and by 1921, it housed over 80 percent of global film production. During World War II, the area became a major center for shipbuilding and aircraft manufacturing.

Reader's Guide

The majority of the city proper lies in the Los Angeles Basin adjacent to the Pacific Ocean in the west and extending partly through the Santa Monica Mountains and north into the San Fernando Valley, with the city bordering the San Gabriel Valley to its east. It is the county seat and most populated city of Los Angeles County, which is the most populous county in the United States with an estimated 9.86 million residents. It is the third-most visited city in the U.S. (after New York City and Miami), with over 3.6 million visitors as of 2023. Los Angeles has a diverse economy with a broad range of industries. Despite a decline in film production, it is the oldest and one of the largest hubs of film and television production. It has one of the busiest container ports in the Americas. In 2024, the Los Angeles metropolitan area had a gross metropolitan product of over $1.295 trillion, making it the city with the third-largest GDP in the world, after New York and Tokyo. Los Angeles hosted the Summer Olympics in 1932 and 1984, and will host the games for a third time in 2028.

Did You Know?

• The original name of the settlement is disputed; the Guinness Book of World Records rendered it as 'El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Ángeles del Río Porciúncula'.
• Since the 1930s, the pronunciation /lɔːs ˈændʒələs/ has been most common.
• Los Angeles created the first municipal zoning ordinance in the United States on September 14, 1908.
• The historic center of Tongva power in the region was the settlement of Yaanga, meaning 'place of the poison oak'.