Scarce birdseye view of Santa Rosa, California, published by Elliott & Co. in Oakland, California.

Rare bird's-eye view of Santa Rosa, north of San Francisco, produced for Guy E. Grosse, "Broker in Real Estate, Proprietor of Rincon Heights and Fruit Dale." There are views of notable buildings at top and bottom, and a key to 52 locations.

Reps locate on three copies, at the Society of California Pioneers, the Huntington Library, and the Amon Carter Museum; the Library of Congress only has a facsimile. Reps 405.

The first settlement of Santa Rosa was the homestead of the Carrillo family, in-laws to Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo, who settled the Sonoma pueblo and Petaluma area. In the 1830s, during the Mexican period, the family of María López de Carrillo, built an adobe house on their Rancho Cabeza de Santa Rosa land grant, just east of what later became downtown Santa Rosa.

By the 1850s, a Wells Fargo post and general store were established in what is now downtown Santa Rosa. In the mid-1850s, several prominent locals, including Julio Carrillo, son of Maria Carrillo, laid the modern town plan for Santa Rosa with a public square in the center.

In 1867, the county recognized Santa Rosa as an incorporated city and in 1868, the state officially confirmed the incorporation, making it officially the third incorporated city in Sonoma County, after Petaluma, incorporated in 1858, and Healdsburg, incorporated in 1867.

In 1870 Santa Rosa was the eighth largest city in California.