The beautiful Brentwood area of Contra Costa County is the oldest continuously populated community in California inland from the great coastal centers. Californios eschewed this challenging portion of the Central Valley, so pioneering physician John Marsh established a permanent settlement here in 1837 at his Rancho Los Meganos. Soon, the burgeoning viniculture, wheat, orchard, and cattle operations attracted many Gold Rush miners back to their original agricultural callings, now in the California Delta. The 1860s arrival of British agribusiness concern Balfour Guthrie Investment Company soon established the largest grain-export and fruit-packing venture in the West. Brentwood Township, established in 1878 and named for Marsh's ancestral home in England, includes some of the state's most bountiful land. The region fostered the greatest wheat production west of the Mississippi River during the 19th century.

Carol A. Jensen, author of Arcadia Publishing's Byron Hot Springs, The California Delta, and East Contra Costa County, presents here in vintage photography the best of Brentwood, culled from local archives and collections. Combined with Jensen's prose, these images showcase Brentwood's progression from rural beginnings as an agricultural stronghold to the modern city of houses, shops, schools, and places of worship we know today.

This book is part of The Images of America series that celebrates the history of neighborhoods, towns, and cities across the country. Using archival photographs, each title presents the distinctive stories from the past that shape the character of the community today. Arcadia is proud to play a part in the preservation of local heritage, making history available to all.

The book is a new, trade paperback, published in 2023 by Arcadia Publishing. It measures 9" x 6" and weighs 0.70 pounds.