Description

Leona Valley is a wonderful small town located in its geographic namesake of Leona Valley, just west of Palmdale. This valley is a long narrow valley separated from the Antelope Valley by the Ritter Ridge, so named after one of the settlers from Nebraska in the 1880's. The valley is about a mile wide and 25 miles in length. The geographic area of Leona Valley is also home to the towns of Lake Hughes and Lake Elizabeth. Leona Valley residents enjoy a different setting from the desert landscapes of the surrounding Antelope Valley communities. This quiet community displays beautiful rolling hills decorated with green farmland, cherry orchards, and horse barns. This ideally located community enables its residents to enjoy the best of two worlds. Leona Valley is best known for its agriculture, particularly cherries. The town of Leona Valley holds its annual Leona Valley Cherry Festival in honor of its agricultural heritage.

History

Leona Valley's history can be best described as land abundant with cattle ranches. In the mid-1800s, after the departure of the Shoshone Indians ? the area's original inhabitants ? immigrants from Spain and Mexico quickly established themselves within the land. The majority of the Spanish and the Mexican immigrants were primarily interested in the land in order to establish cattle ranches. During the 1880s, the ranches were broken up into smaller homesteads by farmers from Germany, France and the state of Nebraska.