Entry #2 - Strawberry Fields

  Strawberries are a #1 favorite fruit for a big population of the United States, and they come from a lot of different areas, but almost everyone can agree California has the best strawberries. Funny enough, theres a certain city in california dedicated to growing strawberries, Oxnard, CA. Oxnard, CA holds a lot of personal value to me because most of my family resides there, thats where my dad grew up and I plan on moving there in the next couple of months. It is truly a wonderful city, but the strawberries and the cities history with strawberries is my favorite part. 

Oxnard, California is considered by many, the strawberry capital of the world! Local farmers of Oxnard have been farming these strawberries to be as sweet as possible for a long time. A certain couple, “Bob and Lupe Jones began growing strawberries in Oxnard, California in 1958 and quickly garnered a reputation for farming some of the highest quality and best tasting strawberries in the nation. The Bobalu brand actually debuted in 1962 as they expanded into marketing and shipping strawberries beyond Oxnard..” (https://bobaluberries.com) This sweet couple has been working hard at these strawberries since 1962, and starting in 2017 they started distributing Strawberries to Mexico. My grandmother would tell me stories of when she first moved to Oxnard in the 1950’s, they were transporting strawberries from Oxnard to Japan! That is a truly incredible journey for fruit. Researching into my grandmas stories, I couldn’t find any cold hard facts on the transportation to Oxnard to Japan, but I did find something even more interesting! According to La Times, article Our Strawberry Roots by Russ Parsons, (https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1997-04-16-fo-51347-story.html) “A survey taken in 1910 found that almost 80% of the strawberry growers in Los Angeles County were Japanese.”  That is super impressive! Additionally, in this article, it talks about a young man, whose grandfather traveled from Nagoya to Oxnard and got a job on one of the many strawberry fields. This young man, named Glen Hasegawa manages the farm his grandfather had created to this day. I knew these strawberries had a very deep history in California, but to learn many of the great people who grew these sweet fruits came such great distances and made history in a small town is so cool! 

I have such a special appreciation and respect for these farmers growing these amazing strawberries. I have such nostalgia every time I drive down Gonzales Rd, and pass the miles of Strawberry fields covered in white tarp. The long stretch of green on the way back to my grandmothers house coming back from the beach has always been such an important memory to me, so being able to learn and share what I’ve learned about the history of the towns connection to Strawberries is very fulfilling for me.