1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Santa Rosa

SANTA ROSA, a city and the county-seat of Sonoma county, California, U.S.A., situated in a broad valley (altitude about 180 ft.) among the Coast Ranges, about 52 m. N. of San Francisco. Pop. (1900) 6673, (1029 foreign-born); (1910) 7817. It is served by the North-Western Pacific and the Southern Pacific railways. Santa Rosa is in a region admirably adapted to the growing of hops—the city is an important hop market—and of fruit and grain, and the handling of these products is a leading industry. Poultry and dairying interests are also important. It was the home of Luther Burbank (b. 1849), the originator of many new flowers, fruits and vegetables, including the Burbank potato, the pineapple quince, and the stoneless prune. Santa Rosa was first settled about 1838, was laid out and incorporated in 1853, replaced Sonoma as the county-seat in 1854,

and was chartered as a city in 1867. In the earthquake of the 18th of April 1906 it suffered severely.