Congratulations on your quasi … quenti … quadralater … err, Happy Quasquicentennial!
Yep, the county I was born in and grew up in is now way old. Way, way old. Here’s a bit of a look back at Orange County, California:
On this date back in 1889 Orange County was officially formed
In celebration of this event, the Orange County Board of Supervisors has approved “OC125” – the official name for the observance.
The territory known as the California Republic officially became the State of California, the 31st state in the United States of America, on September 9, 1850.
At that time, the area we know as Orange County was part of Los Angeles County. During the early formative years of the state, several attempts were made to break away from Los Angeles, and become a separate county. A severe drought in the 1860s devastated the cattle ranching industry, and land barons like Richard O’Neill, Sr. and James Irvine snatched up the empty lands. In 1887 silver was discovered in the Santa Ana Mountings, and this brought settlers to the county where they formed communities and cities.
Finally, in 1889 the only area Assemblyman, Col. E.E. Edwards of Santa Ana, introduced a new bill which would allow local residents to vote on whether or not they wanted to create the new county. William H. Spurgeon, the founder of Santa Ana and Republican James McFadden joined with Edwards to lobby the state legislature. San Francisco – eager to gain prominence over Los Angeles – joined in as well. The bill passed both Houses, and on March 11, 1889 Governor Robert Waterman signed the bill into law.
The vote was held on June 4, 1889 with the residents deciding by a margin of 2,509 to 500 that they wanted to separate from Los Angeles and form their own county. Another election was held on July 17 to choose the location of the county seat and to elect the first county officers.
The county was officially created on August 1, 1889, and the new Board of Supervisors met for the first time on August 5, 1889 in the county seat of Santa Ana, County of Orange, California.
When the county was first formed, there were only three incorporated cities, and the population of the entire county was 15,000.
Orange County covers an area of 948 square miles; 197 square miles of that is land, the remaining area is water. Our population has grown from 15,000 to 3,010,232, and the number of cities has grown from 3 to 34.