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Santa Monica is a beachfront city in western Los Angeles County, California, United States. Situated on Santa Monica Bay, it is bordered on five sides by different neighborhoods of the city of Los Angeles: Pacific Palisades to the north, Brentwood on the northeast, West Los Angeles on the east, Mar Vista on the southeast, and Venice on the south. The 2020 U.S. Census population of Santa Monica was 93,076. Due to its favorable climate and proximity to Los Angeles, Santa Monica became a famed resort town by the early 20th century, attracting celebrities such as Marion Davies to build magnificent beach front homes on Pacific Coast Highway (PCH). The city has experienced a boom since the late 1980s, through the revitalization of its downtown core, significant job growth, and increased tourism. Popular tourists sites include Pacific Park on the Santa Monica Pier and Palisades Park atop a bluff over the Pacific Ocean. As in other coastal beach communities, coastal erosion, due to coastal infrastructure and high human usage, is an increasing challenge, and will become worse due to sea level rise. Santa Monica has a history of developing environmental and sustainability strategies, with the most recent focus on community-wide carbon neutrality by 2050 or sooner. [edit] History
Santa Monica was inhabited by the Tongva people. Santa Monica was called Kecheek in the Tongva language. The first non-indigenous group to set foot in the area was the party of explorer Gaspar de Portolà, who camped near the present-day intersection of Barrington and Ohio Avenues on August 3, 1769. Named after the Christian Saint Monica, there are two different accounts of how the city's name came to be. One says it was named in honor of the feast day of Saint Monica (mother of Saint Augustine), but her feast day is May 4. Another version says it was named by Juan Crespí on account of a pair of springs, the Kuruvungna Springs (Serra Springs), that were reminiscent of the tears Saint Monica shed over her son's early impiety.
Following the Mexican–American War, Mexico signed the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, which gave Mexicans and Californios living in state certain unalienable rights. US government sovereignty in California began on February 2, 1848.
Amusement piers became popular in the first decades of the 20th century and the extensive Pacific Electric Railway brought people to the city's beaches from across the Greater Los Angeles Area. Around the start of the 20th century, a growing population of Asian Americans lived in and around Santa Monica and Venice. A Japanese fishing village was near the Long Wharf while small numbers of Chinese lived or worked in Santa Monica and Venice. The two ethnic minorities were often viewed differently by White Americans who were often well-disposed towards the Japanese but condescending towards the Chinese. The Japanese village fishermen were an integral economic part of the Santa Monica Bay community.
The Great Depression hit Santa Monica deeply. One report gives citywide employment in 1933 of just 1,000. Hotels and office building owners went bankrupt. In the 1930s, corruption infected Santa Monica (along with neighboring Los Angeles). The federal Works Project Administration helped build several buildings, most notably City Hall. The main Post Office and Barnum Hall (Santa Monica High School auditorium) were also among other WPA projects. Douglas's business grew with the onset of World War II, employing as many as 44,000 people in 1943. To defend against air attack, set designers from the Warner Brothers Studios prepared elaborate camouflage that disguised the factory and airfield. The RAND Corporation began as a project of the Douglas Company in 1945, and spun off into an independent think tank on May 14, 1948. RAND acquired a 15-acre (61,000 m2) campus across the street from the Civic Center and is still there today. The completion of the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium in 1958 eliminated Belmar, the first African American community in the city, and the Santa Monica Freeway in 1966 decimated the Pico neighborhood that had been a leading African American enclave on the Westside. Beach volleyball is believed to have been developed by Duke Kahanamoku in Santa Monica during the 1920s. Santa Monica has two hospitals: Saint John's Health Center and Santa Monica-UCLA Medical Center. Its cemetery is Woodlawn Memorial. Santa Monica has several local newspapers including Santa Monica Daily Press, Santa Monica Mirror, Santa Monica Star, and Santa Monica Observer. [edit] Research Tips
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