The City of Compton is one of the oldest communities in Los Angeles County. Its heritage dates back to the early mission and rancho days of Spanish California. Most of the area that is included inside the corporate boundaries of Compton was a part of Rancho San Pedro. This land was granted in 1784 by the Spanish Crown to Juan José Dominguez, a retired soldier who had been a member of the pioneer colonizing expedition led by Captain Gaspar de Portolá and Junípero Serra, the Franciscan missionary.
Rancho San Pedro originally comprised more than 75,000 acres stretching from the Los Angeles River east, beginning at what is now the northeast corner of the City of Compton and extending west and south to the Pacific Ocean, taking in all of what is now Gardena, Torrance, the Palos Verdes Hills and the entire San Pedro-Wilmington Harbor area.
Ten years after the United States acquired California; Rancho San Pedro became one of the first of the original Spanish land grants to receive full confirmation of title under a federal patent awarded to the Dominguez heirs by President James Buchanan.
The entire area now know as Compton was included in a tract purchased in 1866 by two Americans, Francis P.F. Temple and Fielding W. Gibson, at a sheriff’s sale. The tract contained slightly more than a Spanish square league, which translates into something over 4,660 acres.
Settlement of the Temple & Gibson tract began in July 1867, when Harmon Higgins and John K. Morris each bought 80 acres adjacent to what is now Alondra Boulevard and Wilmington Avenue. Later that year, a wagon train loaded with settlers and their families located farther east, near the Los Angeles River. This group, led by Griffith Dickenson Compton and William Morton, came from a village called Woodbridge.
When the Compton-Morton wagon train arrived at the Temple & Gibson Tract, the area was known as Gibsonville, in honor of Fielding W. Gibson. Gibsonville was the title used in land sales for a few years but it never caught on with the settlers.
The selection of a permanent name centered on the surnames of the two principal founders, Morton and Compton. Although Morton was one of the most successful farmers in the area, Compton was more active in community affairs. He became an agent for his neighbors in a number of land transactions, often helping them with their financial problems. He was also active in several community projects including: organizing the Methodist Church (which is still in existence today), serving as a trustee of the first elementary school and participating in negotiations for the railroad right-of-way through the Temple & Gibson Tract.
In the fall of 1868, the first use of G.D. Compton’s name as the title of the town appeared, when the location of a transaction was recorded as “Comptonville.” The name didn’t last long. Settlers petitioned for a local U.S. Post Office in late 1868 asking that the installation be named Comptonville. The U.S. Postal service approved the post office but advised the townspeople to choose a different name, as “Comptonville” already belonged to a gold mining town in Yuba County, north of Sacramento. Wishing to avoid confusion and minimize delays, the postal officials suggested that the name be shortened to Compton. When the post office opened on July 6, 1869 the official name of the little farming community on the Temple & Gibson tract became Compton.
More than 20 years after the City was founded residents decided they wanted a more efficient government. In the late spring of 1888 a petition was approved calling for the incorporation of Compton as a chartered city in the Sixth Class. Following approval by the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors, the petition was officially ratified by the state legislature and the City of Compton was officially incorporated on May 11, 1888.
The City of Compton is known as the “Hub City” because of its unique position in almost the exact geographical canter of Los Angeles County. Five freeways outline the general boundaries of the City and provide superior access to destinations throughout the region. These include Interstate Highways 105, 110, 710, and 405, along with State Highway 91. The Long Beach and Los Angeles Ports are less than 20 minutes from downtown Compton, providing easy access to international destinations for customers, suppliers and leisure travelers. The Alameda Corridor, a passageway for 25 percent of all U.S. waterborne international trade, runs directly through the City from north to south. Collectively, these multi – faceted transportation links lend justification to the City’s familiar name “the Hub City."
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