About Pittsburg

Pittsburg is an industrial city in eastern Contra Costa County, California in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area. The population was 63,264 at the 2010 census.

In 1849, Colonel Jonathan D. Stevenson (from New York) bought the Rancho Los Medanos land grant, and laid out a town he called New York of the Pacific.[9] By 1850, this venture failed. With the discovery of coal in the nearby town of Nortonville, California, the place became a port for coaling, and adopted the name Black Diamond, after the mining firm that built the Black Diamond Coal Mining Railroad from there to Nortonville. Because of the industrial potential of the site, a name change to Pittsburg was proposed in 1909.

Pittsburg, originally settled in 1839, was called first "New York Landing", then "Black Diamond", before citizens voted on "Pittsburg" on February 11, 1911. The name "Pittsburg" has at least two origins. First, it was the name of a coal mining company that built a railroad in 1865 on the eastern edge of what is now the city. Second, some citizens wanted to honor Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, (without the "H"), because of the city's relations with the steel building industry, which was first established by the Columbia Geneva Steel Company. The original town site fronts on the Sacramento River Delta, reflecting its origins as a deep water channel river port. (As of January 1, 2007, state legislation [Assembly Bill 2324] enabled the city to manage its own riverfront for commercial development and subsequent port operations).

Since the early 1900s, the city has grown inland to the south, then spread east and west along State Route 4, now a freeway carrying resident commuters to jobs in the San Francisco Bay-Oakland Region. In the process, the former town of Cornwall, California was absorbed. The city has enjoyed continued residential redevelopment growth near its northern boundary, as well as ongoing construction of major subdivisions in the southwest hills, including San Marco Villas. As of the 2000 census, the city had a total population of 56,769.

The post office first opened in 1868 as Black Diamond, and changed its name with the town's in 1911.