Newport Beach is a seaside city in Orange County, California, United States. Newport Beach is also home to Newport Harbor. The recorded history of the Newport Beach, California, region began when the area was first explored by Europeans in the 1500s. Prior to that time, Native Americans such as the Tongva and Juaneño/Luiseño people had been living in the area for thousands of years. Explorer Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo mapped the coastline in 1542, but it was 200 years before Europeans settled the area. In 1769, Newport was a small portion of the land grant of Don José Antonio Yorba I, first under Spanish and then Mexican rule. After the Civil War, the land was developed by American settlers: for ranching by James Irvine and for shipping by James McFadden. A small settlement was built around McFaddens’ Wharf (at the location where the Newport Pier is today) and it became the largest business of Orange County, California. Following the opening of the San Pedro Harbor in Los Angeles in 1899, the commercial shipping industry in Newport declined. Newport Beach developed into a tourist and recreational boating community. in August 1906, Newport Beach became incorporated as a city.