Featuring a heavy concentration of industry and the third-largest oil field in the continental United States, this neighborhood has a high percentage of Latino and foreign-born residents. Nearly 20 percent of Wilmington’s total land area is taken up by oil refineries — roughly 3.5 times more area than is dedicated to open and accessible green spaces.[3] During the COVID-19 pandemic, Wilmington had one of the highest death rates in all of Los Angeles County, exacerbated by elevated levels of industrial pollution. [4]
It is the site of Banning High School, and ten other primary and secondary schools. Wilmington has six parks.
Wilmington dates its history back to a 1784 Spanish land grant. It became a separate city in 1863, and it joined the city of Los Angeles in 1909. Places of interest include the headquarters U.S. Army for Southern California and the Drum Barracks built to protect the nascent Los Angeles harbor during the American Civil War.
A total of 53,815 people were living within Wilmington's 9.14 square miles, according to the 2010 U.S. census—averaging 5,887 people per square mile, among the lowest population densities in the city as a whole. The median age was 28. The percentages of people from birth through age 34 were among the county's highest. Population was estimated at 54,512 in 2008.[6]
Wilmington is not considered very diverse ethnically, with a diversity index of 0.245.[7] In 2000, Latinos made up 86.6% of the population, while non-Hispanic whites were at 6.4%, Asians at 4.8%, blacks at 2.6% and others at 1.7%. Mexico and Guatemala were the most common places of birth for the 44.5% of the residents who were born abroad, considered a high percentage of foreign-born when compared with the city and the county as a whole.[6]
The $40,627 median household income in 2008 dollars was average for the city. Renters occupied 61.5% of the housing units, with homeowners occupying the rest. In 2000 there were 1,524 military veterans, or 4.6% of the population, relatively low in comparison to the city and county as a whole.[6]
The area that is now Wilmington was inhabited by the Tongva people of Native Americans. Archeological work in the nearby Chowigna excavation show evidence of inhabitants as far back as 7,100 years ago.[9]
Phineas Banning acquired the land that would become Wilmington from Manuel Dominguez, grand nephew and heir to Juan José Domínguez, in 1858 to build a harbor for the city of Los Angeles.[10] Known as New San Pedro from 1858 to 1863, it was subsequently renamed Wilmington by Banning, a.k.a. “Father of the Harbor”, after his birthplace, Wilmington, Delaware.[11]: 7 [1]
In 1861, at the beginning of the Civil War, Banning and Benjamin Wilson gave the federal government 60 acres of land to build Drum Barracks to protect the nascent Los Angeles harbor from Confederate attack.[11]: 8
Wilmington was a township in the 1870 census. The township consisted of the present-day South Bay communities, Compton, western Long Beach, parts of Rattlesnake Island[12] and Mormon Island which later evolved into Terminal Island.[13] Census records report a population of 942 in 1870. The township had been named San Pedro Township in 1860.[14]
Los Angeles annexed Wilmington in 1909,[15] and today it and neighboring San Pedro form the waterfront of one of the world's largest import/export centers. Citizens of Wilmington were dubious that annexation would be in their best interests, fearing that it would shift economic activity out of their city and towards Los Angeles. Because the city government of Los Angeles so strongly wanted to have the growing port inside the city limits, it made a number of promises to Wilmington and also to the equally-dubious citizens of the-then independent city of San Pedro. Among these promises were that $10 million would be invested in improvements to the port and that as much would be spent inside the city on public works as was collected in taxes.[16]
In the 1920s, William Wrigley Jr. built innovative housing in Wilmington that was dubbed the “Court of Nations.”[11]: 9
Wilmington is adjacent to the Wilmington Oil Field, discovered in 1932. It is the third largest oil field in the continental United States. Consequently, there are at least 8 major refineries in the Wilmington area, many of them dating back to the original strike.[17]
The Phillips 66 refinery in Wilmington is also home to the "world's largest jack-o'-lantern", which in fact is a 3 million gallon (11.3 million liter) storage tank decorated every year for Halloween. Decorated annually since 1952 (back when it was owned by Union Oil), the jack-o'-lantern draws 30,000 visitors annually.[19][20]
The Banning Museum - Phineas Banning—entrepreneur, the founder of the city of Wilmington, and “the Father of the Port of Los Angeles”—built the 23-room residence in 1864.[21]
The community of Wilmington is located in the Council District 15 within the City of Los Angeles.
The community of Wilmington is represented by one Neighborhood Council, Wilmington Neighborhood Council.
Educationedit
Only 5.1% of Wilmington residents aged 25 or older had completed a four-year degree by 2000, a low figure when compared with the city and the county at large, and the percentage of those residents with less than a high school diploma was high for the county.[6] Wilmington is home to Harbor Teacher Preparation Academy, ranked the top high school in the city of Los Angeles and the fourth-best school in California. [24]
East Wilmington Greenbelt Community Center, 918 North Sanford Avenue. Basketball courts (lighted/indoor), class room, after school programs, day camps.[27][31]
East Wilmington Greenbelt Pocket Park, 1300 East O Street[27][32]
Wilmington Recreation Center, 325 North Neptune Avenue. Auditorium, baseball diamond (lighted/unlighted), basketball courts (unlighted/outdoors, lighted/indoors), children's play area, community room, four picnic areas with tables.[27][33]
The Wilmington Waterfront Park, opened in June 2011 between the Port of Los Angeles and Wilmington.[35] (This park is not, in fact, on any waterfront: the name is a misnomer.)
^ abJohn Steven McGroarty (1921). Los Angeles from the mountains to the sea: with selected biography of actors and witnesses to the period of growth and achievement. American Historical Society. p. 14. Retrieved August 15, 2012.
^"San Pedro Community Plan" (PDF). Retrieved October 11, 2023.
^ Mahoney, Adam. (August 4, 2022). Deaths have spiked in this polluted California port community. Covid is only part of the story. Grist. Retrieved October 16, 2022, from https://grist.org/health/excess-deaths-wilmington-california-covid-pollution/ }
^ Mahoney, A. (June 22, 2022). A community poisoned by oil. High Country News – Know the West. Retrieved October 16, 2022, from https://www.hcn.org/issues/54.8/south-pollution-a-community-poisoned-by-oil}
^http://projects.latimes.com/mapping-la/neighborhoods/region/harbor "Harbor," Mapping L.A., Los Angeles Times
^ abcdhttp://projects.latimes.com/mapping-la/neighborhoods/neighborhood/wilmington "Wilmington," Mapping L.A., Los Angeles Times
^http://projects.latimes.com/mapping-la/neighborhoods/diversity/neighborhood/list/#wilmington "Diversity," Mapping L.A., Los Angeles Times
^Mexican Americans in Wilmington. Arcadia Publishing.
^Greene, Sean; Curwen, Thomas (May 9, 2019). "Mapping the Tongva villages of L.A.'s past". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved April 27, 2020.
^ abOlivia Cueva-Fernández (February 21, 2011). Mexican Americans in Wilmington. Arcadia Publishing. p. 7. ISBN 978-0-7385-8174-3. Retrieved August 15, 2012.
^ abcdWilmington Historical Society (April 23, 2008). Wilmington. Arcadia Publishing. ISBN 978-0-7385-5610-9. Retrieved August 15, 2012.
^"Water and Power Associates". waterandpower.org. Retrieved September 11, 2020.
^Paul R. Spitzzeri (Fall 2007). "What a Difference a Decade Makes: Ethnic and Racial Demographic Change in Los Angeles County during the 1860s" (PDF). Branding Iron.
^U.S. Census Bureau. "Population of the United States in 1860: California" (PDF).
^Los Angeles examiner, Los Angeles (1912). Press reference library: being the portraits and biographies of progressive men of the Southwest. The Los Angeles examiner. p. 134. Retrieved August 15, 2012.
^Robert M. Fogelson (June 9, 1993). The Fragmented Metropolis: Los Angeles, 1850-1930. University of California Press. p. 117. ISBN 978-0-520-08230-4. Retrieved August 15, 2012.
^Gordon Laird (November 10, 2009). The Price of a Bargain: The Quest for Cheap and the Death of Globalization. Macmillan. p. 131. ISBN 978-0-230-61491-8. Retrieved August 15, 2012.
^Roger W. Lotchin (2003). The Bad City in the Good War: San Francisco, Los Angeles, Oakland, and San Diego. Indiana University Press. p. 163. ISBN 978-0-253-21546-8. Retrieved August 15, 2012.
^Virtual Globetrotting: "World's Largest Jack-O-Lantern"
^Convenience Store News: "The Great Pumpkin Returns to ConocoPhillips' Wilmington Refinery", October 14, 2005.