Editing El Cajon, California (section)

==History==
During Spanish rule (1769–1821), the government encouraged settlement of territory now known as California by the establishment of large land grants called ''ranchos'', from which the English word ''ranch'' is derived. Land grants were made to the Roman Catholic Church, which set up numerous missions throughout the region. In the early 19th century, mission ''padres' ''search for pastureland led them to the El Cajon Valley. Surrounding foothills served as a barrier to straying cattle and a watershed to gather the sparse rainfall. For years, the pasturelands of El Cajon supported the cattle herds of the mission and its native Indian converts.

Titles to plots of land were not granted to individuals until the Mexican era (1821–1846). The original intent of the [[Mexican secularization act of 1833|1834 secularization legislation]] was to have church property divided among the former mission Indians, but most of the grants were actually made to rich "[[Californios]]" of Spanish background who had long been casting envious eyes on the vast holdings of the Roman Catholic missions. In 1845, California Governor [[Pio Pico]] confiscated the lands of [[Mission San Diego de Alcala]]. He granted 11 square leagues (about {{convert|48800|acre|disp=or|abbr=on}}) of the El Cajon Valley to Dona Maria Antonio Estudillo, daughter of [[José Antonio Estudillo]], ''alcalde'' of San Diego, to repay a $500 government obligation. The grant was originally called Rancho Santa Monica and encompassed present-day El Cajon, Bostonia, Santee, Lakeside, Flinn Springs, and the eastern part of La Mesa. It also contained the {{convert|28|acre|abbr=on|adj=on}} Rancho Cañada de los Coches grant. Maria Estudillo was the wife of Don [[Miguel Pedrorena]] (1808–1850), a native of Madrid, Spain, who had come to California from Peru in 1838 to operate a trading business.

With the cession of California to the United States after the [[Mexican–American War]], the 1848 [[Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo]] provided that the land grants would be honored. As required by the Land Act of 1851, a claim for Rancho El Cajon was filed by Thomas W. Sutherland, guardian of Pedrorena's heirs (his son, Miguel, and his three daughters, Victoria, Ysabel, and Elenain) with the Public Land Commission in 1852, confirmed by the U.S. Supreme Court, and the grant was patented in 1876. In 1868, Los Angeles land developer [[Isaac Lankershim]] bought the bulk of the Pedrorena's Rancho El Cajon holdings and employed Major Levi Chase, a former Union Army officer, as his agent. Chase received from Lankershim {{convert|7624|acres|abbr=on|sigfig=3}} known as the Chase Ranch. Lankershim hired Amaziah Lord Knox (1833–1918), a New Englander whom he had met in San Francisco, to manage Rancho El Cajon. In 1876, Knox established a hotel there to serve the growing number of people traveling between [[San Diego]] and [[Julian, California|Julian]], where gold had been discovered in 1869. Room and board for a guest and horse cost $1 a night. The area became known as Knox's Corners but was later renamed.<ref>City of El Cajon, [http://www.ci.el-cajon.ca.us/misc/Arch.html "The Downtown El Cajon Arch,"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110505181551/http://www.ci.el-cajon.ca.us/misc/Arch.html |date=May 5, 2011 }}, retrieved April 24, 2011; a copy is archived by WebCite® at</ref><ref>City of El Cajon, text of [http://www.waymarking.com/gallery/image.aspx?f=1&guid=7a51871f-0166-483d-88c5-c2e7fd23b259&r=200 plaque] on the Memorial Arch at intersection of Main and Magnolia Streets, 2009.</ref> By 1878 there were 25 families living in the valley, and a portion of the hotel lobby became the valley post office with Knox as the first postmaster. The  San Diego, Cuyamaca and Eastern Railway reached El Cajon in the 1880s.<ref>http://sdrm.info/history/sdc/index.html</ref>

El Cajon was incorporated as a city in 1912.<ref>{{cite book |last=Hellmann |first=Paul T. |title=Historical Gazetteer of the United States |date=2005 |publisher=Taylor & Francis |isbn=978-0-203-99700-0 |page=86}}</ref> For the first half of the 20th century, El Cajon was known for its grape, avocado, and citrus agriculture.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Tomatoes |url=https://ncmg.ucanr.org/files/183442.pdf |access-date=June 25, 2023 |website=www.ncmg.ucanr.org}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=Federal Writers Project of the Works Progress Administration|title=San Diego in the 1930s: The WPA Guide to America's Finest City|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WqRau492FDcC&pg=PA113|date=April 16, 2013|publisher=University of California Press|isbn=978-0-520-95465-6|page=113}}</ref>

In the 1960s and 1970s, Frontier Town, Big Oak Ranch, <!---1722 Harbison Canyon Road---> was a tourist attraction, featuring a typical frontier-town theme park and a periodic simulated shootout. The park closed around 1980 and is being used for residential housing.

[[Cajon Speedway]] was a {{convert|70|acre|ha|adj=mid|race track}} that operated from 1961 to 2005. It was founded by [[Earle Brucker Jr.]] of the El Cajon Stock Car Racing Association. One of his sons, Steve Brucker, later took over ownership of the track. Although the speedway closed after the death of Steve Brucker, it is now a historic museum featuring the original entrance sign with the slogan "The fastest 3/8-mile paved oval in the West."<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/sports/sdut-travel-top-50-speedway-el-cajon-jimmie-johnson-2013jul06-htmlstory.html|title=Sports site No. 8: Cajon Speedway|date=July 6, 2013|newspaper=San Diego Union-Tribune|first=Michael |last=Gehlken|language=en-US|access-date=March 16, 2020}}</ref><ref name="sdut">{{Cite news|url=https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/sdut-1s2carnotes224447-earle-brucker-jr-83-longtime-ope-2009apr02-story.html|title=Earle Brucker Jr., 83, longtime operator of Cajon Speedway|date=April 2, 2009|work=San Diego Union-Tribune|language=en-US|access-date=March 16, 2020}}</ref>