Orange County BusinessHistory

The Schmid Collection

http://www.chapman.edu/argyros/oc.bus.his

Orange County Agriculture

Agriculture refers to the production of agricultural goods through the growing of plants and the raising of domesticated animals.

Presented By:Rosa Paulin

Sponsored by the Walter Schmid Center for International Business

The Beginning: Early Development of Orange County Agriculture

Tribal Boundaries within Southern California

Juaneño and Gabrieliño Indians , both peaceful tribes, were the original inhabitants of the area before the arrival of the first Spaniards in Orange County on July 27, 1769.

Spanish and Indian interaction--1700s

The Tongva, dubbed as Gabrieliños, and the Acagchemem, dubbed as Juaneño Indians, due to their respective locations surrounding the Missions San Gabriel and San Juan Capistrano in what are now Los Angeles and Orange Counties, lived as hunters and gatherers until they were forced into farming slave labor by the Spanish with the introduction of the Missions.

On November 1, 1776 Mission San Juan Capistrano was founded by Father Junipero Serra who deemed the area upon which the mission was built, an ideal place to farm land, simultaneously, ideal for converting the Indians into their Western ways of life.

The Jewel of the California Missions: San Juan Capistrano

San Juan Capistrano after the 1912 Earthquake

The Secularization Act of 1833 led to the confiscation of mission properties and distributed the lands amongst Mexican Citizens (native or naturalized), putting an end to the mission system.

Orange County Agriculture: The Rancho Period

The California Rancho Period (1821-1847)

The cattle industry rose from the exploitation of large tracts of unimproved land granted to Mexican citizens with their new independence (1821); it thrived during the Gold Rush and eventually dwindled in the 1860s.

Dana Point, 1920

During the Rancho Period, the Dana Point bluff was used as an easier means of transporting hides; the hides were thrown off the top of the cliff down to the waiting boats.

Western Ranchero Lifestyle—1800s

Dependant upon variable rainfall and native grasses, the cattle industry was devastated after a flood in the 1860s followed by a severe drought which wiped out most of the cattle, and by the 1870s the industry had vanished.

Bastanchury Ranch in La Habra Valley- -1870s

Temporarily replacing the faltered cattle industry, sheep ranches ranged throughout much of Orange County during the 1860s and 1870s .

Death to the Rancho Period:The Birth of the Orange County

Agricultural Industry

Postcard of a California orange orchard, 1905

Before residential and commercial development overwhelmed the area, Orange County was a major producer of citrus crops, walnuts, avocados, apricots, lima beans, sugar beets, celery, tomatoes, and other crops.

Early Anaheim

1860s-After the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, one of the first successful settlements in Orange County was Anaheim, where American settlers grew crops and grapes with the intention of making wine.

Bottling whine for the Ernest Browning Winery

These workers shown, coming from a variety of different backgrounds and skills, are a prime example of new colonists who would initiate the Orange County agricultural industry we know today.

Irrigation: The Key to the Agricultural Industry in Orange County

Tuffree Reservoir outlet-late 1800s

Irrigation played an important part in the early development of Orange County.

Rafael Navarro, a Zanjero, with his horse Tom

The Zanjero, who regulated the supply of irrigation water running though open ditches was considered an important person in early Anaheim.

Anaheim Union Water Company flume number 8, 1880s

Anaheim Union Water Company’s flume Number 8 helped to irrigate the dry land of the surrounding communities.

Drilling for water, 1890s

Drilling for water in the 1890s provided the life-giving substance that made the Orange County desert bloom.

Anaheim Union Water Company Cement Yard, 1908

View of nine men making irrigation pipes at the cement yard of the Anaheim Union Water Company.

Irrigation ditch in FullertonIn 1923 officials from seventy-five cities gathered in Fullerton to discuss the problem of insufficient water, eventually coming up with a strategy urging Congress to adopt the Swing Johnson Bill that would insure the construction of the Boulder Dam and bring water from Colorado to California.

Killing the Grape Industry: Experimenting with Agriculture in

Orange County

Dreyfus Winery, 1884

In 1885, before receiving its official name, “Pierce’s Disease,” a catastrophic and mysterious virus, also known as “Anaheim’s Disease,” wiped out 25,000 acres if grapes, leaving vines dry and wilted.

English walnuts, also known as Persian walnuts

J.R. Congdon of Santa Ana claimed to have planted the first English walnuts in what is now Orange County, at Capistrano, in 1870.

Walnuts were placed in slate trays, dipped in bleach and then laid out to dry before sending to the packing houses.

Walnut drying on Katella Ranch-late 1890s

Picking chili peppers

Their birth began in Anaheim, 1890—at one time, virtually all the chilies grown in California were raised along Orange County's coastal plain, but by 1980 none were grown commercially.

Newspaper ads, 1890s

Local famers’ wives advertised their homegrown poultry and eggs.

Apricot pickers pose for a photo

Apricots, the boom crop of the 1890s, were grown primarily in El Toro, La Habra, and Santa Ana, although they thrived in other parts of the country as well.

Drying apricots in Orange County, California 1891

After the arrival of the Southern Pacific Railroad in 1877, growers could ship dried fruit in large amounts across the country and even to Europe.

Fashions of the 1890s through the 1920s called for ostrich plumes, and some Orange County famers took to the commercial raising of ostriches.

Atherton Ostrich Farm in Placentia, 1896

Billy Frantz and Frank Eastman with their ostriches

Billy Frantz and Frank Eastman, Orange County locals, shown here with Napoleon and Bonaparte, tried to train their ostriches to race and perform in the circus.

Celery Fields, c. 1900

The celery industry was introduced to the county by D. E. Smeltzer, a Michigan celery shipper, who came to Southern California in 1890 in search of land suitable for the crop, however, he was unsuccessful.

Celery Fields, c. 1900

Later efforts by the Earl Fruit company were successful but short-lived when the fertility of the land began to decline in 1906 and weakened celery plants were struck by blight, eventually replaced by beans and sugar beats.

Early 1900s: Attracting New Settlers to the blooming county of Orange

Newspaper ad attracting people to Orange CountyBy the end of WW I, prospective home buyers poured into Orange County, many of them lured south by brochures printed by the Orange County Board of Supervisors and the Santa Ana Chamber of Commerce.

Romanticized Posters of Orange County, early 1900s

Romanticized portrayals of daily life such as this woodland scene, promising an idyllic rural existence, did much to attract new residents to Orange County.

Eating watermelon—El Toro, California 1908

A watermelon feast at the 1908 El Toro School picnic has these children in good spirits for this impromptu photo.

James Irvine II

In 1889, James Irvine II rode his high wheeler from San Francisco to San Diego, stopping at the Irvine Ranch to look at the huge property he had inherited from his father in 1886.

Holly Sugar Beat Factory—Santa Ana, CA

In 1911, James Irvine formed the Santa Ana Cooperative Sugar company, then bought out by the Holly Sugar Company in 1917.

Wagons bring sugar beets to a “beet dump”

Between 1897 and 1914, five sugar beet factories existed in Orange County, but the sugar beet crop infestation by nematodes was a serious problem, leaving only one factory in operation by 1930.

James Irvine II

James Irvine II, owner of Irvine Ranch, was a prominent Orange County citizen and owner of the largest agricultural land tract in the area.

Irvine Ranch Avocado Orchard-early 2000s

Irvine Ranch harvested a variety of crops: beans, barley, oranges, walnuts, apricots, limas, peanuts, chilies, and in 1930 the first commercial lemons were planted.

George W. Beck had a ranch called “The Garden of Fruits” in La Habra Heights, California, where he grew the first commercial avocados in Orange County, as well as many varieties of sub-tropical fruit.

George W. Beck with papayas, between 1910-1927

Crate label, "Fancy California Avocados", Orange Fruit Co., Orange, California, 1940s

Who planted the first commercial avocados in Orange County is debatable, however, the first avocados to ever be planted in California, as reported in the California State Agricultural Report for 1856, was a tree grown by Dr. Thomas White in San Gabriel.

Knott’s Berry Farm

Knott’s Berry Farm

Walter and Cordelia Knott founded and built the present-day amusement park in what is now currently Buena Park in 1920, as a 10-acre berry farm.

Boysenberries

During the 1920s, by crossing a loganberry with a blackberry and a raspberry Rudolph Boysen developed a new strand of berry, which Mr. Knott then transplanted to his farm where they thrived and are now known as boysenberries in honor of their creator.

Knott’s Boysenberry Jam

Knott’s Berry Farm’s boysenberry jam and an assortment of other flavors can be purchased at almost any grocery store across the U.S.

The Citrus Industry in Orange County

orange tree next to a vineyard

The first orange tree in Orange County was probably first planted by William N. Hardin, a medical doctor and Anaheim's justice peace, who, in 1870 brought two barrels of rotten Tahitian oranges and planted some of the seeds.

Crate label for "Tick-Tock Oranges, Villa Park, California, 1930

1872—Albert B. Chapman, founder of the town of Orange, brought a new orange tree to Orange County from Florida; his Spaniard employee named the new trees, Valencia, after the region in Eastern Spain.

Sunflower Brand Valencia oranges, Olive Hillside Groves Inc., 1925

Valencia oranges have tremendous advantages: First, they are much juicer than navels, and second, they ripen at the peak of summer, when their cool juice has much more consumer appeal.

Portrait of Mr. and Mrs. Gilman

1875--Richard H. Gilman, owner of the Semi-Tropical Fruit Company, is credited with setting out the first commercial grove of Valencia orange—on the land that is today the campus of California State University, Fullerton.

Lemon pickers in lemon grove, Orange, California 1903

Lemons were first planted in Orange County by A.D. Bishop, an early citrus grower of Orange County.

Central Lemon Association Sunkist packing house truck, c. 1921

To protect themselves from the exploitation of commission merchants, Orange County growers formed a marketing cooperative of their own in 1893, the Southern California Fruit Exchange, later called the California Fruit Grower’s Exchange and finally as Sunkist Growers in 1952.

Valencia Oranges crate label

The Exchange hired marketing experts to promote the orange as the “golden glory” from the land of sunshine and Old World romance and to convert the orange into a staple of the daily diet.

Radiant brand crate label, 1920

The sunshine image was incorporated into a trademark, Sunkist, which was test marketed in Iowa in 1905, then adopted for all the exchange’s produce.

Villa Park Orchards Association display at the New York Fruit Auction, 1936

The goal for Sunkist was to invade Midwestern and Eastern markets; special trains carrying oranges eastward were adorned with promotional banners.

Central Lemon Association packing line, 1930

Orange County agriculture as a whole peaked in 1930; farmers and ranchers grossed fifty-one million Depression dollars, mostly from citrus, walnuts, beans, sugar beets, peppers, tomatoes, and livestock.

Painting of a typical orange grove

At the height of the citrus industry, Orange County had over 65,000 acres of groves and forty-five packing houses, forming the county’s number one agricultural crop.

Lemon Heights, 1930s

Lemon Heights, located to the northeast of Tustin, was covered with miles and miles of citrus groves and eucalyptus trees from the 1930s to through the 1960s.

Tractor pulling cultivator in Sunkist orange grove, circa 1930

Central Lemon Association workers washing lemons, early 1930s

Publicity photograph--California Valencia Orange Show

The California Valencia Orange Show was introduced by the Anaheim Chamber of Commerce to feature the areas most important product, the Valencia Orange.

1922 Valencia Orange Show

The first of many successful shows until 1931, opened on May 17, 1921; it featured displays, contests, and products centering around Valencia oranges.

1930s Citrus Queen

Activities surrounding the Valencia Orange Show included the naming of a citrus queen.

Award certificate 10th Annual California Valencia Orange Show, 1930

This particular copy was awarded to the Mutual Orange Distributors of Orange, California: "First prize Class No. 11-A for the best cluster of Oranges."

Challenges for Orange County Agriculture

Oil Fields of Placentia, California

At the turn of the century 20th century, a young oil industry emerged, which prospered during the 1920s , and began a war for land and power with the farming industry Orange County.

Charles C. Chapman

Charles C. Chapman was an early citrus producer in the Fullerton area and in 1919 he became the proud owner of one of the most productive oil wells in the state.

The Chapman Building (Wilshire and Harbor)

Oil Sea—Orange County

The discovery of oil was not without problems, as seen by this oil sea in a nearby famer’s field.

The Flood of 1938

From February 27 to March 3, 1938, a series of storms flooded the rivers, reaching a peak around midnight when the Santa Ana River breached its bands, taking houses, cars, and destroying thousands of acres of agricultural land.

orange grove with snow, 1947

For those who don’t believe it has ever really snowed in Orange County.

Immigration & Civil Rights in the Agricultural Industry of Orange County

Field citrus orchard with workers, McPherson, California, 1925

Expanding agriculture brought in a melting pot of migrant workers-- local ranchers and their families, first Chinese, and then Japanese and Filipino workers, and both local and migrant Mexican-American workers all found employment in the area.

Chinese picking Oranges in a Placentia field--1895

Some Chinese immigrants, first brought to California as railroad workers, were recruited as farms workers in Orange County in the mid-and late nineteenth century.

Orange County Japanese-American

Japanese Immigrants began arriving in the 1890s as farm domestic workers and by the early 1900s constituted a significant minority population, setting up shops and churches, and becoming sharecroppers and eventually landed farmers.

Farmer Matsukane, 1935

For this 1935 photograph, farmer Matsukane and his field hands paused for a moment in a sugar beet field at Santa Ana, near what is today the corner of McFadden and Harbor Boulevard.

3/13/42

After Japanese attacks on Pearl Harbor, resentment and distrust stirred against Japanese Americans, and with the issuing of the Exclusionary Order, all Japanese were to be moved out of Orange County.

4/18/42

A Yugoslavian farmer is taking over berry farm formerly operated by residents of Japanese ancestry, who are being sent to assembly points and later to be housed in War Relocation Authority centers for the duration.

Japanese-American War Relocation Victims

Unfortunately, upon their return to Orange County, the 600 Japanese Americans that came back after the war, would find their homes vandalized or in ruins and their crops deteriorated or dead.

The Bracero Program in Orange County

Bracero Program, 1942-1964

During World War II, due to the expansion of agriculture and a lack of laboring hands, the U.S. government devised the Bracero Program (1942 through 1964), allowing Mexican nationals to take temporary agricultural work in the United States.

Medical examinations before braceros entered the country

1, 650 bracero workers were used for the 1943 citrus crop harvest in Orange County, but even they were not enough and the Citrus Growers Inc. brought in Jamaicans and even used German POWs to help with the harvest.

“Battle for Work”--Los Angeles Times January 7, 1954

Here is a portion of the 800 braceros in Mexicali who massed against wall of U.S. border patrolmen for the chance to be selected for one of the coveted farm jobs last week. Some fainted in crush.

The first braceros, 1942Before the program ended in 1947, an estimated 200,000 braceros worked in twenty-one states, about half of them in California.

César Chávez, Dolores Huerta, Robert F. Kennedy

César Chávez and Dolores Huerta opposed the Bracero Program and helped to end it, believing that the program undermined U.S. workers and exploited the migrant workers.

César Estrada Chávez, Coretta Scott King, and Dorothy Day, 1973 1962--César Estrada Chávez was a Mexican-American farm worker, labor leader, and civil rights activist who, with Dolores Huerta, co-founded the National Farm Workers Association, which later became the United Farm Workers.

César Chávez on strike with a group of followersTraveling among California's field and farm communities, Chavez slowly built a core team of dedicated farm-worker members, and in September 1965, his 1,200-member organization joined an AFL-CIO strike against Delano area table and wine grape growers.

In 1988, the 61-year-old Chavez used a 36-day "Fast for Life" to protest the harmful effects of pesticides on farm workers and children.

Funeral procession for Cesar Chavez-- Delano, California, 1993

César Chávez helped famer’s right s in Orange County and all over California until his death in 1993.

The Fall of the Citrus Empire in Orange County

Orange City Park picnic grounds, Orange, California, 1950

A human tsunami swept over Orange County in the 1950s, wiping much of the citrus and agricultural industry in Orange County with it.

McPherson Heights Citrus Association packing house on its last legs, 1951

Between 1954 and 1963, 79 percent of Orange County’s agricultural land was converted to housing business, schools, and highways.

M & M nursery--Orange, California, est. 1956

By 1967, Orange County’s suburban development had reached as far back as the Saddleback Valley and “suburban crops”—nursery stock and cut flowers—had taken over accounting for the 18 percent of all agricultural income, on their way to 48 percent by 1986.

Newport Freeway (55) under construction, 1964/65

As the construction of the freeway moved south, growth followed, and by the late 1960s and early 1970s, the old communities of El Toro, San Juan Capistrano, and San Clemente were sprouting houses where acres of orange groves and scenic hillsides had once been.

Segerstrom Ranch (left), City of Costa Mesa (right)This 1971 view of the San Diego Freeway looking south provides an interesting study in the contrast between the older agricultural lifestyle and the newer urban developments.

Strawberry FieldsAside from the nursery industry, strawberries became a major cash crop in Orange County, totaling $64 million in 1986.

Asparagus—Irvine Company land, late 1980s

In the late 80s , the new agricultural trend was the designing of crops; “designer crops” genetically engineered for the expanding fruit and vegetable departments of the grocery stores.

Former orange packing house, 2003

Orange, which had the first packing house in Orange County, in 2003 is home to the last, the Villa Park Orchards Association.

Automatic packing machine at Villa Park Orchards Association, 1996

Oranges as a staple food in the American diet—Orange County’s legacy.

Connie Rodriguez, a 50-year employee of Villa Park Orchards Association, 1996

A last glimpse at the Orange County citrus days.

sorting orangesThis year, the California Valencia oranges, which are now produced outside of Orange County, are hot for two reasons: hurricanes and citrus diseases in Florida have slashed the state’s orange production in years, and the low value of the dollar compared with other currencies has juiced up exports of California fruit.

Although agriculture of today is no longer a high-profile industry, it contributes more than $300 million to the local Orange County economy. When all economic factors are considered, including payroll, purchase of goods and transportation, agriculture has a total value to the local economy of $1 billion.

Resources

http://www.shapethefuture.org/features/images/chavez-1965.jpghttp://content.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/kt2k40119z/?brand=oachttp://www.getcliparts.com/wpcontent/uploads/2008/02/orange_fruit_1280x1024.jpg http://spyhunter007.com/guinness_players_biography.htm http://www.image-archeology.com/Walter_Knott_Founder_&_Owner_of_Knott's_Berry_Place_34.jpg http://www.zimbio.com/member/StewWriter/pictures http://www.image-archeology.com/knotts_berry_farm.htm http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001FA1BA2?ie=UTF8&tag=googhydr-20&hvadid=2256446201&ref=pd_sl_5wxprhy0yn_bhttp://www.nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/Montebellohttp://www.laurelcanyon.org/Images/EarlyPhotos/IndianHut.gifhttp://cache.virtualtourist.com/2341221-Arched_Mission_Corridor_and_Ruins-San_Juan_Capistrano.jpghttp://www.cuca.k12.ca.us/lessons/missions/Capistrano/SanJuanCapistrano.html#Localhttp://www.ocf.berkeley.edu/~kennyk/oc/early.htmlhttp://content.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/kt900023c6/?docId=kt900023c6&layout=printable-detailshttp://boards.brownpride.com/showthread.php/bracero-program-5681.html?s=dc075ed69c242e9b34789a903a1fecc7&http://americanhistory.si.edu/ONTHEMOVE/themes/story_51_5.htmlhttp://www.mentecritica.net/wp-content/uploads/bracero-queue.jpghttp://content.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/hb0v19n72p/http://giannini.ucop.edu/pdfs/giannini04-1b.pdfhttp://www.sjchistoricalsociety.com/photographs.html

http://www.ocf.berkeley.edu/~kennyk/oc/land.htmlhttp://www.cityoforange.org/localhistory/default.htmlatimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2008/07/http://www.ocnursery.com/index.htmlhttp://latimesblogs.latimes.com/pardonourdust/images/2008/04/25/avocados.jpghttp://bp1.blogger.com/_BAcueiOjGFs/R0S3LfTKBYI/AAAAAAAAAUo/DkgKgwurtY4/s1600-h/31462blog.jpghttp://www.medaloffreedom.com/CesarChavez_RobertKennedy.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%C3%A9sar_Ch%C3%A1vezhttp://www.ocf.berkeley.edu/~kennyk/oc/twenty.htmlhttp://www.sbcounty.gov/flood/Flood%20Planning/pages/storm.htmweb.mst.edu/~rogersda/umrcourses/ge342/http://content.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/ft367nb1xv/content.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/kt8489p7f2/content.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/kt7v19q3q0/?docI...content.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/kt7q2nc6x6/?docI... http://content.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/kt829021zt/?query=&brand=calispherehttp://content.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/kt8q2nc832/?brand=calispherehttp://content.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/kt6m3nc0s8/?brand=oachttp://content.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/kt9h4nc2fb/?brand=oachttp://content.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/kt3r29q0xr/?brand=oachttp://content.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/kt5w1018z2/?brand=oachttp://content.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/kt3x0nb9bg/?brand=oac

http://www.thebeachcities.com/dp.htmlhttp://content.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/kt2f59q1sw/?docId=kt2f59q1sw&layout=printable-detailshttp://www.cityoforange.org/localhistory/plaza/parades.htmhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Juan_Capistrano http://content.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/kt767nc0jb/?brand=oachttp://content.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/kt2k40119z/?brand=oachttp://www.shapethefuture.org/features/images/chavez-1965.jpghttp://www.route66ca.org/traveler/towns/31duarte/images/ranchos.jpgwww.route66ca.org/.../towns/31duarte/31toc.htmlhttp://dana-point-condos.com/1-dana-point-by-the-sea.jpg

• Brigandi, Phil. Orange : The City 'Round the Plaza. Ed. Lori Parks. New York: Heritage Media Corporation, 1997.

• Faessel, Stephen J. Early Anaheim. Grand Rapids: Arcadia, 2006.

• Cramer, Esther R. La Habra, the pass through the hills: The formative years of a Southern California community from 1769. Sultana P, 1969.

• Hallan-Gibson, Pamela. Orange County the Golden Promise : An Illustrated History. New York: American Historical P, 2002.

• Emmons, Steve, and Mark Boster. Used book Orange County: a History and Celebration. New York: Harry N. Abrams Inc., 1988.

• Orange County. Grand Rapids: Arcadia, 2005.

Special Thanks to Shauna Farley

&P.K. Shukla