The original town of Brookings was established by John E. Brookings, when he moved his lumber business from the San Bernardino Mountains of Southern California in 1913. Brookings hired a renowned architect, Bernard Maybeck, to lay out the street design for what is now the core area of the city.
Because of its unusually mild climate, Brookings is known as "The Banana Belt of Oregon." Flowers bloom all year, about 90 percent of the country's Easter lily bulbs are grown locally.