The schools in Clayton rank near the top of all schools in the State and within the local school District. There is a new middle school within the town boundaries; the elementary and high schools are only minutes away. There is a high level of parental participation in the schools and a high level of satisfaction of both students and parents.
The history of Clayton dates back to 1848 when gold was discovered in the area. Brothers Joel and Charles Clayton moved to the area from Oregon to seek their fortune. In 1853, Joel purchased 40 acres at the confluence of Mitchell and Mt. Diablo creeks and built a home in 1855. Two years later, the town of Clayton was born with two hotels and little else. After the discovery of coal just east of town, Clayton operated primarily as a mining town until the turn of the century, although Joel did establish a 28-acre vineyard in 1863. In the early 1900s, thanks to the development of several small shipping ports along the coast, the area became an agricultural center. The story of the development of Point Sal as an important shipping center for farmers of the Santa Maria Valley is tied to the brothers Clayton as well as Charles Haskell Clark and his wife, Eliza Clayton Clark. Eliza Clark's father was Joel Clayton. His frontier spirit prompted him to see all he could of California. He had visited the Rancho Guadalupe and had learned that the rancho boundaries ended at the top of the mountain above the jutting finger of Point Sal. With the help of his congressman brother Charles, Joel obtained title to about 1,000 acres of land, perhaps foreseeing the possibility of a port for the developing valley, and no doubt becoming interested in the gypsum outcropping of the promontory. When his daughter Eliza married the young Vermonter, Charles Haskell Clark in 1864, in the little town of Clayton, Joel Clayton presented the Point Sal land to her as a wedding gift. In spite of Point Sal's massive shoulder the prospective harbor often was beset by mountainous waves that crashed thundering against the cliffs. By 1871, a wharf was completed at the point. As soon as the Valley farmers learned that ships could unload cargoes at the Point, they drove the long hilly road to the ocean to buy lumber for their new farm dwellings and other buildings. Ten cargoes of lumber were unloaded through the surf in 1871, old records state, and over a million feet of the lumber was purchased by settlers in the Santa Maria Valley. Getting produce to market had been a tremendous drain on men and horses. Farmers were overjoyed when the wharf at Point Sal was ready for business in 1874. Contra Costa County was incorporated in 1850 as one of the original 27 counties of the State of California. It is one of the nine counties in the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Area. The county is the ninth most populous in the state at nearly 950,000. It covers about 733 square miles and extends from the northeastern shore of San Francisco Bay easterly about 50 miles to San Joaquin County. The western and northern shorelines are highly industrialized, while the interior sections are suburban/residential, commercial and light industrial. The county contains 19 incorporated cities including Richmond in the west, Oakley in the northeast and Concord in the middle. A large part of the county is served by the Bay Area Rapid Transit District ("BART"), which has encouraged the expansion of both residential and commercial development. In addition, economic development along the Interstate 680 corridor has been substantial and has accounted for significant job creation in the cities of Concord, Walnut Creek and San Ramon. While population grew in every city in the county during the 1990s, population growth has been strongest in unincorporated areas as well as in the eastern portion of the county, particularly in Antioch, Brentwood and Clayton. The county has one of the fastest growing work forces among Bay Area counties, with growth in its employment base being driven primarily by the need to provide services to an increasing local population. Major industries include petroleum refining, telecommunications, financial and retail services, steel manufacturing, prefabricated metals, chemicals, electronic equipment, paper products and food processing. |