About Manhattan Beach

Manhattan Beach is a beachfront city located in southwestern Los Angeles County, California, USA. It is an upscale community, and contains some of the most expensive real estate in the Los Angeles county area. The city is on the Pacific coast, south of El Segundo, and north of Hermosa Beach. Manhattan Beach is a hotspot for beach volleyball and surfing. Every August, the city hosts the Manhattan Beach Open Volleyball tournament and the International Surf Festival. It is one of the three Beach Cities in the South Bay. Since the late 1990s, the area has become home to numerous professional athletes and celebrities.

As it lies within commuting distance to Hollywood and downtown Los Angeles, Manhattan Beach is a popular residence for professional athletes and executives in the entertainment industry. Property in Manhattan Beach, especially near the waterfront, is very expensive. For instance, a half acre of land on the Strand in Manhattan Beach is valued at $35 million while a half acre of land in Bel Air is valued at $20 million. Homes with an ocean view often exceed $5 million in cost. Manhattan Beach has one public high school, Mira Costa High School.

In 1863, a Scottish immigrant, Sir Robert Burnett, purchased Rancho Sausal Redondo and Rancho Aguaje de la Centinela from Avila's heirs for $33,000. Ten years later in 1873, Burnett leased the ranch to a Canadian, Daniel Freeman (not the American Daniel Freeman, who was the first to file a claim under the Homestead Act of 1862). Burnett returned to Scotland. Freeman moved his wife and three children onto the ranch and started growing various crops. On May 4, 1885 Freeman bought the ranch from Burnett for $140,000.

George H. Peck owned a lot of the land that became part of the north section of Manhattan Beach. A coin flip decided the town's name. Around 1902, the beach suburb was named "Manhattan" after developer Stewart Merrill's home town, Manhattan, New York. "Beach" was appended to the city's name in 1927 at the behest of the postmaster.

Much of Manhattan Beach was once sand dunes. During the 1920s and 1930s some of that sand was shipped to Waikiki, Hawaii to convert their reef and rock beach into a sandy beach. Some of the sand was also used to build the Los Angeles Coliseum and portions of Pacific Coast Highway.

Manhattan Beach benefits from ocean breezes that provide very clean air and summer temperatures that are 10 to 20 degrees fahrenheit cooler than Southern California inland regions. The city has a total area of 4.9 square miles (13 km2). Manhattan Beach features 2.1 miles (3.4 km) of ocean frontage. Much of Manhattan Beach was once exposed sand dunes which now lie beneath the city's buildings and streets. The western part of the city is quite hilly because of the underlying dunes. The tallest hill is 244 feet high and is located in the southwest portion of the city. The only remaining exposed sand dune is at Sand Dune Park.