Pomona

Pomona is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. Pomona is located in the Pomona Valley, between the Inland Empire and the San Gabriel Valley. As of the 2010 United States Census, the city’s population was 149,058.

The city is named for Pomona, the ancient Roman goddess of fruit. For Horticulturist Solomon Gates, “Pomona” was the winning entry in a contest to name the city in 1875, before anyone had ever planted a fruit tree The city was first settled by Ricardo Vejar and Ygnacio Palomares in the 1830s, when California and much of the now-American Southwest were part of Mexico. The first Anglo-Americans arrived in prior to 1848 when the signing of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo resulted in California becoming part of the United States. By the 1880s, the arrival of railroads and Coachella Valley water had made it the western anchor of the citrus-growing region. Pomona was officially incorporated on January 6, 1888.

In the 1920s Pomona was known as the “Queen of the Citrus Belt”, with one of the highest per-capita levels of income in the United States. In the 1940s it was used as a movie-previewing location for major motion picture studios to see how their films would play to modally middle class audiences around the country (for which Pomona was at that time viewed as an idealized example).

Pomona is approximately 27 miles (43 km) east of downtown Los Angeles, 25 miles (40 km) north of Santa Ana, 31 miles (50 km) west of Riverside, and 37 miles (60 km) west of San Bernardino.

Pomona is bordered by the cities of San Dimas on the northwest, La Verne and Claremont on the north, Montclair and Chino on the east, Chino Hills and Diamond Bar on the south, and Walnut, South San Jose Hills, and Industry on the southwest. The Los Angeles/San Bernardino county line forms most of the city’s southern and eastern boundaries.

The city is the site of the Fairplex, which hosts the L.A. County Fair and the NHRA Auto Club Raceway at Pomona, (formerly known as Pomona Raceway) Powerade Winternationals Drag Racing competition.

The city also hosts the Pomona Swap Meet and the Classic Car Show. The Classic Car Show is considered by many[who?] to be a Southern California classic. It is one of seven major events hosted at the Fairplex each year.