Riverside

A bit of history

Riverside was founded in 1870 by John W. North and a colony of Easterners seeking to build a community centered on education and culture. In 1873 the U.S. Department of Agriculture sent local resident Eliza Tibbets two Brazilian navel orange trees, and the fruit's success touched off a citrus boom that made Riverside, by 1895, the wealthiest city per capita in the nation. That "Orange Empire" era left behind institutions like the University of California Citrus Experiment Station, now part of UC Riverside's agricultural research programs. One of Tibbets' original trees still stands and bears fruit in the city today.