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 Founded in 1887, the city was named for a railroad employee, George Fullerton who was responsible for routing the Santa Fe train line into area. George was the President of the Pacific Land and Improvement Company. He was persuaded to alter his planned rail route to include the tiny, as yet unnamed town. Originally a mustard field, The new rail line turned Fullerton into one of the largest cities in Orange County.
Fullerton´s history is much older than that. Evidence of prehistoric times were found in what is now the "Ralph B. Clark Regional Park". Bones and fossils of saber toothed tigers and mammoths have both been discovered on the property. Those inhabitants eventually gave way to a peaceful tribe of Indians called the "Gabrielinos" who were quite skilled in basket weaving. Their small village was located at what is now Bastanchury Rd. and Malvern Ave.
Later on, Fullerton became Orange County's answer to the Wild West with gun fights in its saloons being a common practice amongst the rough group of employees who worked the citrus shipping and the railroad. With its distinct early California style bungalows, old fashioned streetlamps and neighborhood markets, Fullerton boasts of an era before complete suburbanization of that region of the state during the 1960's.
Charles Chapman was a man who left a significant mark on Fullerton. A descendant of John Chapman, the "Johnny Appleseed" of legend, Chapman was a retired publisher from Chicago who came out west to purchase a 350 acre orchard just east of Fullerton. Chapman revolutionized the citrus industry by assisting the cause of the Valencia Orange, which proved to be an ideal summer orange due to its keeping qualities and late ripening period. Farmers throughout the area copied his lead and the resulting economic boom put Fullerton on the map for being something other than a "stop on the railroad".
By the turn of the century, the first attempt at becoming a formal city was defeated by opponents, who believed that incorporating would be "tantamount to having a saloon on every corner and a house of ill repute in between." By 1904, the incorporation issue again went before the voters, this time associated with the much needed cause of improving fire protection. The Incorporation passed by a vote of 185 to 44 and Chapman was elected the first mayor of Fullerton.
Fullerton entered a new age in 1927 when aviators William & Robert Dowling convinced the city to build an airfield on land that was being used as both a hog farm and a sewer farm. The combination of the two resulting odors must have been quite awful for nearby neighbors, as a unanimous vote was passed. What became the "Fullerton Municipal Airport" is now the only general aviation field still in its original location in all of Orange County.
In the last two decades of the twentieth century, Fullerton revitalized its downtown area, preserving one of the last true downtown districts remaining in Orange County. As Fullerton progresses into the new millennium, both physical development and refining its existing services are continuing to be met by the changing needs and interests of the citizens.
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