The land where the city of Tijuana would be built was originally inhabited by the Kumeyaay, a tribe of Yuman-speaking hunter-gatherers. Europeans arrived in 1542, when the explorer Juan Rodr�guez Cabrillo toured the coastline of the area, which was later mapped in 1602 by Sebasti�n Vizca�no. In 1769, Juan Cresp� documented more detailed information about the area that would be called the Valley of Tijuana. Jun�pero Serra founded the first mission of Alta California in nearby San Diego.
More settlement of the area took place near the end of the mission era when Jos� Mar�a de Echeand�a, governor of the Baja California and Alta California, awarded a large land grant to Santiago Arg�ello in 1829. This large cattle ranch, Rancho T�a Juana ("Aunt Jane Ranch"), covered 100 km (40 sq mi).
In 1848, as a result of the Mexican-American War with the United States, Mexico lost all of Alta California. The majority of the 1,000 Hispanic families living in Alta California stayed there, though some moved south to remain inside Mexico.
Because of this Tijuana gained a different purpose on the international border. The area had been populated by ranchers, but Tijuana developed a new social economic structure. These were farming and livestock grazing, plus as a transit area for prospectors.
Urban settlement began in 1889, when descendants of Santiago Arg�ello and August�n Olvera entered an agreement to begin developing the city of Tijuana. The date of the agreement, July 11, 1889, is recognized as the founding of the city.
Tijuana saw its future in tourism from the beginning. From the late 19th century to the first few decades of the 20th century, the city attracted large numbers of Californians coming for trade and entertainment. The California land boom of the 1880s led to the first big wave of tourists, who were called "excursionists" and came looking for echoes of the famous novel "Ramona" by Helen Hunt Jackson.
In 1911, during the Mexican
