2. Location, History and Economy

Monterey is on the southern curve of Monterey Bay in Monterey County. The community is approximately 345 miles north of Los Angeles and 113 miles south of San Francisco and the City of Monterey encompasses 8.44 square miles. Monterey occupies the ancestral homeland of the Ohlone/Costanoan. The Ohlone Ancestral lands extend from San Francisco Bay to Salinas and there were at least 15,000 Ohlone/Costanoan people before European contact. After two centuries of dispossession and colonization, several tribal communities descendent of the Ohlone/Costanoan continue to live in the area today, preserving and protecting their cultural heritage, traditions and ancestral lands.

The first European contact in Monterey was in 1769 when Gaspar de Portola landed in Monterey Harbor. Monterey was founded in 1770 and incorporated in 1850. The city was the capital of Spanish California until 1822 when Mexico declared independence and laid claim to the area. The city stayed the capital of Alta California under Mexican control until the United States gained power at the end of the Mexican-American war in 1848. Monterey State Historic Park is now located on the old site of California’s capital under Spanish and Mexican rule. On this site, the U.S. flag was first officially raised. The California state constitution was signed in Monterey on October 13, 1849 (Source).

Businessman Thomas Larkin built the community’s wharf in 1845, initially for ferry service and flight. However, as the city’s fishing industry grew in the early 1900s the city took over the wharf and expanded services for the fishing fleet. Southern California’s commercial fishing industry was started by the region’s diverse immigrant communities from China, Japan, Italy, and Portugal. Monterey’s commercial fishing industry began in the 1850s with the arrival of Chinese fishers, who dove for abalone and started California’s squid fishery. Soon the Chinese fleet number near 600 fishers using mostly flat bottom boats. However, a fire destroyed the city’s main Chinese settlement in 1906, and the Chinese fishing fleets on Monterey Bay never fully recovered. At the same time, Portuguese fishers settled in the area, targeting gray and humpback whales for blubber.Japanese fishers arrived in Monterey Bay in the late 1800s. They built the salmon and abalone fisheries and later the sardine fishery. The Japanese fishers brought new techniques for abalone diving that allowed them to fish in deeper water and launched the abalone canning industry. By 1909, an estimated 145 out of 185 salmon boats fishing in Monterey Bay were Japanese owned, as were most businesses at fishermen’s wharf until WWII. Italian fishers also arrived in Monterey in the late 1800s, introducing the lampara net which revolutionized the sardine and canning industry. Fishers of Italian descent have been the predominant ethnic group in the fishery since the 1930s (Source).

The year 1902 marked the beginning of Monterey’s canning industry with the opening of two new canneries. During WWI, increased demand for canned fish, driving cannery expansion and seven additional canneries opened on what would become known as Cannery Row (Source). Between 1915 and 1918, cannery production jumped from 75,000 to 1.4 million cases. In 1928, the arrival of large, modern purse seiners increased the efficiency of the local fishing fleet. After WW1, the canneries continued to be productive by making fishmeal fertilizer, however business slowed during the Great Depression (Source). In the 1930s and 1940s, Monterey was again the center of a thriving fishing industry at Cannery Row and was known as the “Sardine Capital of the World.” However, by the early 1950s the sardine population collapsed and many sardine fishermen moved south to San Pedro (Source). Research has shown the disappearance of sardines from the fishery in the 1950s was due to long oceanographic cycles and not overfishing (Source). The loss of sardines had a significant economic impact on the community due to the community’s heavy dependence on the fishery.

With the collapse of sardines, the fishers and buyers who remained in the Monterey Bay area shifted to other coastal pelagic species such as anchovy, mackerel, and squid. The market squid fishery became California’s largest commercial fishery by volume in 1993, and by 1996 was the most valuable fishery in the state. In 1998, the California legislature adopted regulations for the squid fishery including a moratorium on new vessels and a permit requirement for lightboats (Source). Of the three ports in Monterey Bay, Moss Landing and Monterey have been the two major receiving ports for market squid and coastal pelagic species, however, by the early 2000s, Moss Landing outcompeted Monterey.

The spot prawn fishery was first established in the 1930s in Monterey when prawns were caught incidentally by octopus fishers. In the mid-1970s commercial fishers began trawling for prawns, and in 1979 that it was regulated as a separate fishery from other California shrimp. It was primarily fished by bottom trawlers. Landings peaked in 1981 but soon declined leading to two temporary closures. In the 1980s trap fishing was used to supplement landings during trawl closures and gave spot prawn fishers access to the live markets. By the mid-1990s, both the trawl and trap fisheries were regulated through seasonal closures and gear restrictions. Due to concerns over the impact on other species, spot prawn trawl was prohibited by the California Fish and Game Commission in 2003 (Source). This brought about both a decrease in landings and an increase in value (Source). The Monterey spot prawn fishery has grown in in the 21st Century.

The Monterey waterfront suffered economically after the crash of the sardine fishery but experienced a revitalization in the early 1950s and 1960s with the development of new businesses such as cafes, restaurants, and hotels. The area was popularized by author John Steinbeck in the 1945 novel Cannery Row. In 1958, Ocean View Avenue was officially renamed “Cannery Row.” Monterey continues to celebrate its commercial fishing heritage, and views fishing as essential to the city’s tourism industry. Tourism is now a major driver for the local economy. In 1984, the Monterey Bay Aquarium opened on the site of the old Hovden Cannery. The aquarium is visited by about 1.8 million people each year (Source). In 2009, the city decided to develop a long-term master plan for its waterfront to envision how diverse uses would work together to support a thriving waterfront and tourist economy. In 2016, the Monterey City Council adopted a new Waterfront Master Plan. The Master Plan addresses specific areas of concern, such as sea-level rise, and the relationship of Cannery Row to other important downtown locations.