During the late 1920s and 1930s, the area’s reputation developed for its production of lettuce, lima beans, sugar beets, and walnuts, becoming known as was one of the largest producers of lettuce in the United States by the late ‘30s. The Southern Pacific Railroad trains came up the middle of Sherman Way to pick up freight cars of lettuce on a daily basis during the lettuce harvest season. Around that time, manufacturing roof tile, canning poultry products, and processing walnuts began to emerge as viable businesses as well.