Spreckels, California
Spreckels, California | |
|---|---|
Spreckels in 2018 | |
Location in Monterey County and the state of California | |
| Coordinates: 36°37′19″N 121°38′49″W / 36.62194°N 121.64694°W | |
| Country | United States |
| State | California |
| County | Monterey |
| Government | |
| • State Senator | John Laird (D) |
| • Assemblymember | Dawn Addis (D) |
| • U. S. Rep. | Jimmy Panetta (D) |
| Area | |
• Total | 0.122 sq mi (0.316 km2) |
| • Land | 0.122 sq mi (0.316 km2) |
| • Water | 0 sq mi (0 km2) 0% |
| Elevation | 62 ft (19 m) |
| Population (2020) | |
• Total | 692 |
| • Density | 5,700/sq mi (2,200/km2) |
| Time zone | UTC−8 (PST) |
| • Summer (DST) | UTC−7 (PDT) |
| ZIP Code | 93962 |
| Area code | 831 |
| FIPS code | 06-73612 |
| GNIS feature ID | 1659842 |
Spreckels is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) in the Salinas Valley of Monterey County, California, United States. Spreckels is located 3 miles (5 km) south of Salinas, at an elevation of 62 ft (19 m). Its population was 692 at the 2020 census.
Spreckels is one of the best-preserved company towns in the United States. It was built to house workers for the Spreckels Sugar Company plant, which operated there from 1899 until 1982, named after its founder "Sugar King" Claus Spreckels. When it opened, the Spreckels plant was the world's largest sugar beet factory, each day consuming 13,000,000 US gal (49,000,000 L) of water—with much of it pumped from wells—to process 3,000 short tons (2,700 t) of beets.
Spreckels is associated with the writer John Steinbeck, who lived and worked there for a time, and used it as a setting in his novel Tortilla Flat. Spreckels was used as a location for the 1955 Steinbeck movie East of Eden.