What's with "the Queen of the Angels"? The nickname City of Angels is not a modern invention — it is older than the United States' hold on California. The pueblo's full name was El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Ángeles, the Town of Our Lady, Queen of the Angels, given for a Marian feast day. Over two centuries the town outgrew the long Spanish name, but the "Angels" stayed: Los Angeles has been the City of Angels since 1781, and everything that came later simply borrowed it.
The village grew through the eras. Mexican independence reached Alta California in 1821, opening the rancho years; Los Angeles was incorporated as an American city on April 4, 1850, the year California joined the Union. Cattle gave way to vineyards, then citrus, then oil, and the small pueblo on the river spread across a coastal plain ringed by the Santa Monica, San Gabriel, and Santa Ana mountains until it became the metropolis we know — yet the Plaza, the Plaza Church, and the names of the founders are all still there at El Pueblo.
Why People Visit Los Angeles California
Travelers come for the climate, the coast, and the culture, but the quietest surprise is the history: a two-hundred-and-forty-year-old pueblo tucked into the middle of a modern metropolis. History and everyday life sit side by side here in a way few American cities can match.
