Friday, September 19, 2008

Founded in 1812, Olive is a small community just inside the bend of the Santa Ana River in what is now part of the City of Orange. It was long known for its flour mill and for citrus packing. You can learn much more about Olive on Daralee Ota’s great “Olive Through The Ages” website.
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Today’s first image (top) is a “Celeste” brand label from the Olive Heights Citrus Association around the 1930s. According to the Orange Public Library, "The Olive Heights Citrus Association was located by the railroad tracks on Orange-Olive Road, and was incorporated on November 14, 1914. It burned down in 1927 but was rebuilt across the street and when it closed in 1984, it was one of four remaining packing houses in Orange County." The second photo shows Olive as it appeared in 1912. (Click the image to enlarge it.) Note the mill on the far left side of the image
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Yesterday, the Register featured some stories of Ricardo Juan Valverde’s family, which came to Westminster several generations ago. His grandparents were significantly involved in the landmark Mendez v. Westminster school desegregation case, yet never told him about it. “No one in town, to my knowledge, had ever mentioned the case,” he writes. Interestingly, the Mendez family has similar stories about discovering the case by reading about it later in life. Anyone know why this wasn’t discussed among the families or in the community?
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The Register also published a fascinating review of Gustavo Arellano’s new book. I haven’t read the book myself, so I can’t yet comment. But the review makes it sound like his book is very similar to his work elsewhere.

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