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Through the World Wars the harbor turned San Diego into a Navy city. The deep bay and mild weather made it an ideal homeport, and the fleet, the air station on North Island, and the Marine recruit depot grew into the economic backbone of the region — the Pacific Fleet's principal home and one of the largest naval concentrations anywhere. The bay fed the city too: by mid-century the tuna fleet, crewed largely by Portuguese and Italian fishing families, had made San Diego the tuna capital of the world, and the old Naval Training Center on Point Loma lives on today as Liberty Station. The city built airplanes as well: Charles Lindbergh's Spirit of St. Louis was designed and assembled in San Diego in 1927. For generations of sailors and Marines, 'stationed in San Diego' has been a line in countless life stories, and the phrase still carries the salt air, the gray ships, and the harbor that taught them the Pacific.
Spanish rule gave way to Mexican rule in 1821, and the surrounding ranchos shaped a generation of life before California passed to the United States in 1848. San Diego incorporated as an American city in 1850, but the old settlement clustered around the presidio in what is now Old Town. The modern downtown is the work of one man's gamble: in 1867 Alonzo Horton bought the bayfront flats and laid out a 'New Town' close to the water, betting that a city should sit beside its harbor. He was right, and the center of San Diego has faced the bay ever since.
Why People Visit San Diego
San Diego rewards visitors with a rare mix: deep early-California history, a working Navy harbor, great parks, and miles of Pacific coast under a famously mild sky. People come for Balboa Park and the bay, the beaches and Point Loma sunsets, and the story of the city where California began — historic, easygoing, unmistakably Californian.
