Santa Monica California — Retro Vintage History

What's with the Ferris wheel that runs on sunlight? Out at the end of the Santa Monica Pier, the big wheel turns on solar power — a small, very Californian touch on a wooden pier that has stood over the Pacific since 1909. The pier is the city's signature: the last of the north bay's old amusement piers, with a 1922 carousel still spinning under its hippodrome roof and a neon sign at the foot of it that reads 'End of the Trail.' That sign means something specific. Santa Monica is where Route 66 stops — 2,448 miles from Chicago, America's Main Street runs out of country here and meets the sea.

Long before the road or the pier, this stretch of coast was home to the Tongva (Gabrielino) people, who lived along Santa Monica Bay for centuries. A Spanish expedition camped nearby in 1769 and left the name of a saint on the place; through the Mexican era the land was ranch country, part of the great Sepulveda grant. The Tongva remain part of the Los Angeles region today, and the bay they knew is still the heart of the city that grew here.

Santa Monica as a town dates to 1875, when a Nevada silver senator, John P. Jones, and a ranching colonel, Robert Baker, laid it out as a seaside resort — a 'Pearl of the Pacific' they hoped would become Los Angeles's great port. Jones gave the city the long ribbon of bluff-top land that became Palisades Park, still its finest public space; the railroad arrived the same year; and the town incorporated in 1886. The port ambitions faded — San Pedro won that prize — but the resort stuck, and Santa Monica became the place Los Angeles went to the beach.

The waterfront made the city famous. A mile-long wharf served as Los Angeles's port of call into the early 1900s, before San Pedro took the harbor trade, and a string of amusement piers drew the crowds along the bay. Of them all, the 1909 Santa Monica Pier is the survivor — the last of its kind on the north bay, joined in 1916 by the adjacent Pleasure Pier and crowned in 1922 by the Looff Hippodrome, whose hand-carved carousel still turns and is listed on the National Register. Generations have come for the same things: the rides and the lights at the end of the boards, the long beach on either side, and the Pacific going pink at the close of the day.

Then, in 1926, a number was painted onto the map that gave Santa Monica its most enduring identity. Route 66 — the highway that carried the country west from Chicago through eight states — was routed to end here, at the edge of the continent. The 'End of the Trail' became a destination in its own right: the place where the great American road trip finally runs out of road. For travelers who have driven the whole 2,448 miles, the Santa Monica Pier is the finish line, and that is a story Santa Monica has worn proudly ever since.

The twentieth century layered on more. The 1920s brought a 'Gold Coast' of beach-resort hotels and the first Hollywood money to the sand; in 1921 Donald Douglas founded Douglas Aircraft in Santa Monica, and in 1924 the U.S. Army's first-ever round-the-world flight set out from the city's Clover Field — an aviation chapter that ran here until the 1970s. Muscle Beach built a national fitness culture on the south-end sand in the 1930s and '40s; the Third Street Promenade reinvented downtown for walking in 1989; and the pier's solar Ferris wheel arrived in 1996. Through all of it the bluffs of Palisades Park kept their Moreton Bay figs and their Camera Obscura, looking out over the same bright water.

Our Santa Monica logo carries the California Republic bear and star above '1850,' the year of statehood — the shared retro emblem of every Merlin Classics California place. Drawn in a worn black-and-white that recalls a WPA poster or old pier signage, the bear-and-star is California in shorthand: tough, independent, sun-bleached. The bear is the through-line that links Santa Monica to every other California place we make. What makes this one Santa Monica is everything around it — the pier and the wheel, the Route 66 sign, the palm bluffs, and the long beach on the bay.

Today Santa Monica is California's beach and the end of America's road. Its story runs from the Tongva coast and the senator's 1875 resort, through the amusement-pier era and the founding of an aircraft company, to the Route 66 terminus that still draws travelers to the edge of the Pacific. Our Santa Monica designs gather that identity into wearable form — the bear and star, the pier, and the End of the Trail. Santa Monica, California: where Route 66 meets the sea.

Santa Monica, California — Travel Guide

Visiting Santa Monica Today

Santa Monica sits on Santa Monica Bay where the Westside of Los Angeles meets the Pacific — a compact, walkable beach city of pier, bluffs, and promenade. The 1909 pier and its Route 66 sign anchor the south end of the beach; the palm-lined bluffs of Palisades Park run along the top of the shore; and the Third Street Promenade fills the few blocks inland, all under a famously mild sky.

The Pier, the Bluffs & the Promenade

For visitors looking for things to do in Santa Monica, California:

• Walk out on the 1909 Santa Monica Pier to the Route 66 'End of the Trail' sign, the carousel, and the solar Ferris wheel.
• Stroll the bluff-top lawns of Palisades Park, with its Moreton Bay fig trees and the historic Camera Obscura.
• Spend the afternoon on Santa Monica State Beach, with Muscle Beach's open-air fitness rings at the south end.
• Wander the car-free Third Street Promenade for shops, street performers, and people-watching.
• Take in the bay views and public art at Tongva Park, just inland from the pier.
• Catch the sunset from the bluffs, looking out over the long curve of Santa Monica Bay.

Why People Visit Santa Monica

Santa Monica rewards visitors with a rare mix — a historic amusement pier, the western end of Route 66, miles of beach, and a walkable downtown, all on a bright Pacific bay. People come for the pier and the End of the Trail, for sunsets off the bluffs of Palisades Park, and for an easy California beach day with a long history behind it. It is iconic, friendly, and unmistakably Southern California.

For deeper reading on the Santa Monica history described here — the Tongva (Gabrielino) homeland, the 1769 Portolá camps and the Spanish naming, the Mexican-era Sepulveda rancho, the 1875 founding by Sen. John P. Jones and Col. Robert Baker and the donation of Palisades Park, the amusement-pier era and the 1909 Santa Monica Pier, the 1921 founding of Douglas Aircraft and the 1924 round-the-world flight from Clover Field, and the 1926 establishment of Route 66's western terminus — it may be useful to consult (1) the Santa Monica History Museum, (2) the Santa Monica Public Library's image and history archives, (3) the California State Library and State Archives, (4) the Gabrielino/Tongva cultural resources for Indigenous history, and (5) the National Park Service and Route 66 heritage organizations. For travel and visitor information, it may be useful to contact (1) the Santa Monica Travel & Tourism office, (2) the Santa Monica Pier organization, (3) the City of Santa Monica, (4) California State Parks, and (5) the regional transit and airport information desks.