Fruit Vale Orchards

In the late 1840s, Quaker horticulturalist Henderson Luelling traveled west on the Oregon Trail with his family: his wife and their eight children. Luelling brought a variety of over 700 fruit and nut trees with him from his nurseries in Oregon and Iowa to Oakland, where he and his family settled in 1854. In 1856, he planted cherry, apple, and pear trees in the rich soil near Sausal Creek and named the orchard "Fruit Vale." Later on, horse-drawn streetcars brought people to the orchards for Sunday outings and picnics alongside the creek, where people could enjoy the native berries and fresh farm fruit.