José Antonio Aguirre (industrialist)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

José Antonio Aguirre (1799–1860), was a merchant and rancher in North America, most prominently in what would become San Diego, California, USA.

He was born in Spain, but left for North America at the age of 15, and also became a citizen of Mexico and the United States as national powers rose and fell on the continent. He married Francisca Estudillo, eldest daughter of José Antonio Estudillo, a prominent landowner. Some years after Rosario died during what would have been the birth of their first child, Aguirre married Francisca's sister Rosario Estudillo.

In 1850, Aguirre joined William Heath Davis and Aguirre's brother-in-law Miguel Pedrorena (who was married to another Estudillo sister, Antonia) in an attempt to start a new town near San Diego, but closer to the San Diego Bay.