The photo above, labeled, “View in Poway Valley,” appears in the book, Picturesqe San Diego. Authored by Douglas Gunn and published in 1887, Picturesqe San Diego offers historical snapshots, in both text as well as photos, of San Diego County as it appeared then. The book’s section on the Poway Valley (there was no incorporated city of Poway at that point) refers to the area as a “rich agricultural valley” with a population of “about 800” (compared to an estimated 48,000 in the city of Poway today).

The Poway Valley then had, according to Gunn, “as choice farming lands as can be found in any part of Sourthern California.” In addition to hay, grain, and various varieties of grapes, “Poway peaches are especially noted for size and flavor,” the book said, adding that “Bee-keeping is profitably carried on, a choice grade of honey being produced. Fine cattle are kept, and butter-making is a paying industry.”

The 97-page book includes 72 photos like the one above, showing a very different San Diego City and County from the ones we know today.

There are print copies of Picturesque San Diego available at a few local libraries, but only in-house in the reference area. There’s a downloadable copy available online on the  Internet Archive website at https://archive.org/ .Or you can check out my upcoming Oasis lecture, “Picturesque San Diego: Images and Stories From the Past,” on Wednesday, July 12, at 10 a.m. at the Oasis Lifelong Learning Center at Grossmont in La Mesa. If you can’t make it to Grossmont, I’ll be giving the talk again on August 11 at 10 a.m. at Oasis’ new Rancho Bernardo campus, one of a number of talks on various aspects of local history I’ll be giving in RB in July and August. For further info and to register, visit https://san-diego.oasisnet.org/ and click on “Classes.” Come join me for some San Diego history!