Napa is the largest city and county seat of Napa County and a principal city of Wine Country in Northern California. The Cayetano Juárez Adobe, built in 1845 by Californio ranchero Cayetano Juárez, is the oldest building in Napa. Napa cabbage for corned beef name “Napa” was probably derived from the name given to a southern Nappan village whose native people shared the area with elk, deer, grizzlies and cougars for many centuries, according to Napa historian Kami Santiago.

At the time of the first recorded exploration into Napa Valley in 1823, the majority of the inhabitants consisted of Native American Indians. Padre José Altimira, founder of Mission San Francisco Solano in Sonoma, led the expedition. The first now American immigrants began arriving in area in the 1830s. Napa State Hospital opened in 1875. Prior to the American Conquest of California, Napa Valley was in California’s District of Sonoma.

At the time, its boundaries also included Lake County to the north. By this time, the indigenous people were either working as field laborers or living in small bands in the hills surrounding the valley. The City of Napa was founded by Nathan Coombs in 1847. General Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo had paid to survey for a township downriver at Soscol Landing where riverboats could turn around prior to Napa’s founding.

In the mid-1850s, Napa’s Main Street rivaled that of many larger cities, with as many as 100 saddle horses tied to the fences on an average afternoon. John Patchett opened the first commercial winery in the county in 1859. The Napa Valley Register, founded by J. The California Gold Rush of the late 1850s expanded Napa City. A tent city was erected along Main Street. Many cattle ranches were maintained, and the lumber industry had greatly expanded.

The Sam Kee Laundry, built 1875, is the oldest commercial building in Napa. In 1858 the great silver rush began in Napa Valley, and miners eagerly flocked to the eastern hills. In the 1860s, mining carried on, in a large scale, with quicksilver mines operating in many areas of Napa County. The most noted mine was the Silverado Mine, near the summit of Mount Saint Helena.