Freeway 99, like no other road I've ever traveled, has always seemed to be a state within the Golden State, unrolling through the middle of the world's largest vegetable and fruit garden in which are grown some 200 different products that one can eat, wear or write; and perhaps one of the largest concentration of dairy farms in the country.

And while I have not looked recently, there was a business hard by Traver that makes concrete burial vaults; and while I have never known the Chamber of Commerce to mention it in its promotional material, Fresno has a chicken feed plant nestled in the downtown area which may be why travelers on Freeway 99 sometimes say the city stinks.

If explorer Hernando Cortez searching Mexico, or “New Spain,” for the seven paved-in-gold cities of Cibola some 85 years before the Pilgrims beached at Plymouth Rock, were to return today and venture further north to the San Joaquin Valley, would at least find seven cities producing products worth their weight in gold.

The Valley was named for San (Saint) Joaquin, the father of Virgin Mary, and one holding firmly onto religious concept might even suggest that it was they who blessed this land. And anyone would agree that San Joaquin is certainly a much more sophisticated name than “Jake Valley” which it could have been.

There is said to be no English translation for San Joaquin. Jewish historians say the name is akin to Jacob or Job, or just plain old Jake, which one must suppose spawned the old Okie expression of the 1930s, “Everything's Jake when you'all git to Tulare Lake,” although I do not know that for a fact.

But moving this essay right along to the valley's seven golden cities, they are, from south to north: Bakersfield, Tulare, Fresno, Madera, Chowchilla and Merced.

Oh, you say that's only six cities and you want to know which is the seventh. Well, I will leave that up to you. I mean it depends how far south or north you wish to go, say from Weed Patch and Pumpkin Center to Delhi, Modesto and Stockton.

But it's not Earlimart, Pixley, Tipton, Traver, Kingsburg, Fowler, Selma, Berenda, Fairmead, etc., even though each of these communities undoubtedly has golden attributes of its own.

Bakersfield is named for Old Man Baker who settled there; Tulare for the bulrush and cattail. (The 1930s Okie pronunciation “Tullir” is probably from the Spanish, meaning bird poop.) May I hastily apologize to that fine, upstanding city, but look it up in the dictionary for yourself. Delano perhaps has the most prestigious name in what might have been Jake Valley, named for Columbus Delano, secretary of state when the railroad reached there in 1873.

Earlimart of course was named for early settler Earl I. Mart.

Actually I put you on there. Earlimart was named by the town's promoters to give prospective farmers the impression that crops matured as early there as they did in the Imperial Valley, thus giving them an edge on marketing in the central and northern part of the state.

Pixley was named in the 1880s for Frank Pixley, deceased, founder and editor of The San Francisco Argonaut, a rather fiery fellow who predicted a great agricultural future for the valley.

All right, moving right along, Tipton, was the “tiptown” the railroad reached before construction began to the south.

Traver owes its name to Sacramento land and canal developer Charles Traver; Kingsburg for its proximity to the Kings River; Selma, probably to Selma Michelson Kingsbury, wife of a Central Pacific Railroad official; Fowler to early day State Senator Thomas Fowler; Malaga to the grape; Calwa to the California Water Company and Fresno to the ash tree.

When lumber interests in the Sierra built a flume to the railroad siding in 1876, it chose the Spanish word for wood as an appropriate name for the new town of Madera.

We are now coursing past Antilocapra Americana, (pronghorn antelope) or berrendo, Spanish for Antelope. About 75 California places existed with the name in bygone times, but only two survive, Berendo, a railroad station in Los Angeles County, and what's left of old Berenda in Madera County.

Off to our right a few miles up Freeway 99 is Fairmead which is probably as one might guess, built “o'er the mead,” as William Blake referred to a meadow in his poem, “The Lamb” 200 years ago, although as far as I can determine he was not referring to this particular Madera County village.

Our journey along Freeway 99 concludes today as we tool past fast-growing Rancheria de los Chauciles (or Chausila if you'd rather) as it was known in the 1820s and 30s, but today we call it Chowchilla. And do not for a minute underrate it because it probably has more women per man than any city in these United States. Although if you are looking for a new sweetie, you'll have to wait until they've done their penance.

(Comments to the author at vallefox@accessbee.com.)