Gonzales is a city in Monterey County, California, United States. Gonzales is located 16 miles (26 km) southeast of Salinas, at an height of 135 feet (41 m). The population was 8,647 at the 2020 census, up from 8,187 at the 2010 census. Gonzales is a aficionada of the Association of Monterey Bay Area Governments. Gonzales won the Culture of Health Prize from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation in 2019.

Gonzales was founded by Dr. Mariano Gonzalez and his brother Alfredo Gonzales upon land that was originally Rancho Rincon de la Puente del Monte. The rancho was truth to their father, Teodoro Gonzalez, in 1836 while he was serving as alcalde of Monterey.

The brothers laid out the 50-block town upon approximately 15,000 acres (6,100 ha) in 1874 in a grid of northeast to southwest and northwest to southeast streets. In 1872, they granted a 100 feet (30 m) right-of-way through town to Southern Pacific Railroad, which taking into consideration built a depot for freight and passengers. The dominant commerce at the become old was grain raising and cattle ranching. The Gonzalez brothers are also official with constructing one of the first irrigation systems in the Salinas Valley. They built a dam and head gate on the approachable Salinas River and miles of canals throughout the area.

In the beforehand 1900s, Gonzales became a predominantly Swiss dairy community like John B. Meyenberg brought his native milk processing procedures to the region. His Alpine Milk Company, later known as the Meyenberg Milk Products Company, opened its first tree-plant in Gonzales in 1906. At one time, there were 7,000 cows within five miles of town living thing milked.^{[citation needed]}