| |
 |
The goddess Pomona appears in a relief sculpture above a
portal in Pomona College’s Smith Campus Center, holding a
basket overflowing with fruit. (In fact, in a humorous
detail, one bronze orange has fallen out of her basket and
is visible on the floor below.) But though naming a college
for the Roman goddess of fruit might seem perfectly natural
in a region of California once dominated by orange groves,
the naming of Pomona College is a more complex story.
Indeed, when Pomona College was named, in 1887, the area
where it now stands was mostly desert scrub.
In truth, Pomona bears the name of the town where it was
founded, though oddly enough, it held classes there for only
one year. The College was incorporated on October 14, 1887,
and instruction began in September 1888 in a small rented
house in the newly established town of Pomona. The following
January, however, an unfinished hotel (now Sumner Hall) in
nearby Claremont, together with considerable adjacent
property, was given to the College, which relocated there.
Although the location was originally regarded as temporary,
Claremont became the permanent home of the College. The name
Pomona College had become so closely identified with the
institution, however, that it was retained.
But the College does have a legitimate claim on classical
name origins, if only at second hand. The town of Pomona,
from which the College took its name, was named by a
prominent citrus cultivator in honor of -- you guessed it --
the goddess of fruit.
Learn About Other Pomona Traditions.
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Quick Links |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Explore Pomona's Web |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Find It |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Search |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
