Norco was founding by entrepreneur Rex B. Clark on the notion that a man should be able to feed his family from the land and primarily chickens.  Very quickly Norco was an agricultural powerhouse to be reckoned with leading the entire state in lettuce, melon and walnut production as well as rabbits!

A chance discovery of hot, sweet water wells led to the development of the fabulous Norconian resort - a short lived dream crushed by the great depression. 

The Norco Store

Did you know Norco was...

      ...named after a company baseball team?

      ...once the lettuce capitol of California?

      ...once a leading source of granite for headstones?

      ...where wheelchair basketball was born?

      ...visited by Eleanor Roosevelt and Helen Keller?

      ...where Navy torpedo fuse defects were solved?

Norco Mounted Posse

                   DEDICATED MAY 13, 1923                                    CITY HOOD DECEMBER 1964        

 In the early 1960’s, a desperate real estate salesman by the name of Hal Meese  after watching a couple of horses mosey by his office hit upon the idea of selling Norco’s large lots as “horse property” and the idea stuck.

To protect those large lots against developers, Norco became a city in 1964 and today has branded itself as “Horse Town USA”.

The 1930’s were not kind to Norco, but, with the opening of the US Naval Hospital on the lavish Norconian grounds, things began to look up.  The 1950’s saw a resurgence in agriculture and poultry ranches. However, with the closing of the naval hospital in 1957 and a prolonged drought, Norco was once again plunged into an economic hole. 

Historic Norco Community Center

Norco High School c. 1970