Palo Alto: A History of California, Capitalism, and the World Highlight

The Portuguese Azoreans, for example, settled almost entirely in the Bay Area, where they took up truck farming for fruits and vegetables, as well as the operation of small chicken coops and dairies. “They would work for wages for a while, then rent land, and then finally buy land,” writes one historian, describing the familiar white-immigrant mobility narrative as the Bay Area Azoreans encountered it.24, 25 It was a workable plan, and thousands of Azoreans moved to the area in the 1860s and ’70s, edging Chinese truck farmers into seasonal wage labor.iii