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Questions Please call: 916-773-3003

For more than three thousand years, the rolling hills and grasslands of southern Placer County were home to the Nisenan (Maidu) Indians. Few Europeans visited the area that would become Roseville and none settled in the area.

In 1849, came the discovery of gold just a few miles into the Sierra foothills. With the Gold Rush came an influx of prospectors and the landscape would change forever.

Starting in 1850 the area that would become Roseville was settled by a few ranchers, some of whom were failed miners.

In 1864, a track-laying crew from the Central Pacific Railroad came eastward across the plain from Sacramento, building the western half of the nation's first transcontinental railroad. They crossed a small rail line (the California Central Railroad) that linked the young towns of Lincoln and Folsom, and gave the spot the imaginative name of Junction.

Over the next forty years, Junction evolved into Roseville, a trading center for area farmers. It was greatly overshadowed by neighboring Rocklin, where the Southern Pacific Railroad maintained it's Roundhouse facilities.

Then, in 1906, feeling the need to expand, the Southern Pacific Railroad moved its facilities to Roseville where it remains (and is still the largest rail yard on the west coast). The city incorporated April 15, 1909. They new town built sewer lines and organized its fire department. During the three year period between 1911 and 1914, the citizens of Roseville erected more than 100 structures including the Carnegie Library which now houses the museum.

Roseville in the 1920's

In 1913, the Pacific Fruit Express, the largest ice manufacturing plant in the world was constructed in Roseville to chill fruits and vegetables being shipped from California to other parts of the country. In 1914, the Roseville Telephone Company was formed.

By 1929, the railroad employed up to 1,225 people in it's Roseville yard assembling trains, repairing engines, and handling freight. Then came the Great Depression. It hit Placer County as hard as the rest of the country, but more than 2,000 of Roseville's unemployed found jobs in the Federal Works Progress Administration (W.P.A), paving streets, pouring sidewalks, and building storm sewers. Many sidewalks in older sections of Roseville still have "W.P.A." embossed in the concrete.

The rail yards of Roseville became busier than ever with the onset of World War II. Then the post-war building boom brought continued prosperity, including upgrades to the city owned electric system and construction of a new city hospital. The years 1948 through 1950 saw the construction of a new city hospital and the Washington Street underpass to carry traffic under Vernon Street and the Southern Pacific rail yard tracks.

The pattern of life changed in the fifties. The railroad found stiff competition from the airlines and the development of the national interstate highway system brought competition from interstate truckers. In the late fifties, Interstate 80 came through Roseville, Rocklin, Loomis and Auburn, linking South Placer County with the rest of Northern California. Folsom Dam was completed in 1955, creating a reservoir about eight miles east of Roseville that provided the city with a dependable domestic water supply as well as an excellent recreational amenity.

By 1964, the 100 year old city was peaceful, self-contained and embodied the ideal of a small American town. The publishers of Look magazine recognized that fact when they named Roseville an "All American City" that year.

As the turn of the 21st century approached, Roseville grew into a city with a population of over 70,000 people. With the advent of the "seventies" and "eighties," numerous international corporations relocated here, bringing new technology, opportunities and people into the area.

While Roseville is no longer completely dependent on the railroad, its roots as a "Junction" are as evident today as they were in the last two centuries. The electronics industry is becoming major employers with both Hewlet Packard and NEC among the major employers of Roseville and South Placer County.