The “San Marino” name was imported from the Italian Peninsula – via Maryland. James De Barth Shorb, who founded the town (originally a ranch) in 1877, named it after his childhood home: the San Marino plantation in Emmitsburg, MD. Said plantation took its name from the Republic of San Marino, the tiny nation surrounded by Italy, supposedly because it had the same acreage. And the Republic of San Marino took its own name from Saint Marinus, who in the year 301 established a monastery where the country now stands. Our San Marino, incorporated in 1913, employs parts of the republic’s flag in its city seal. Pasadena’s San Marino Avenue was named by 1889.
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