Orange County City: Aliso Viejo

This week's city of Orange County is Aliso Viejo, CA. Here's a little history of the city according to cityofalisoviejo.com :

Aliso Viejo became Orange County's 34th City on July 1, 2001, yet it’s a community grounded in a rich history that echoes other south Orange County cities.

The community name derives from Spanish for “old alder” or “old sycamore.”

Aliso Viejo was originally part of the 22,000-acre Moulton Ranch. In the 1890s, the Moulton family took ownership of land the Mexican government originally granted to Juan Avila in 1842. In 1976, Mission Viejo Company purchased the last 6,600 acres for a new master-planned community. The ultimate vision for Aliso Viejo was to feature neighborhoods that mix homes, workplaces, stores and services. A transit-friendly, energy-conscious and land-conserving community, Aliso Viejo was to foster a sense of community by creating a friendlier streetscape, quality infrastructure like parks, schools and new roads, shopping close to home, community services and neighbors that genuinely feel connected to the community and to one another in some fashion.

The county approved the master plan for the community in 1979 – and by March of 1982 – the first residential units were offered for sale. About eight months later, the first residents arrived. Shea Properties purchased the Mission Viejo Company in 1988.

In February of 1995, the Self-Governance Subcommittee of Governmental Affairs, an offshoot of the Aliso Viejo Community Association (AVCA), which was the first community-wide property owner’s association of its kind in the state, began its push to make Aliso Viejo a city. Two years later, Aliso Viejo Cityhood 2000 was born. In March of 1999, Aliso Viejo Cityhood 2000 launched a petition drive to put the question of cityhood to a community vote. On March 6, 2001, voters (more than 90 percent) overwhelmingly decided to make Aliso Viejo a city.

Source: http://www.cityofalisoviejo.com/AboutAlisoViejo/GeneralInformation.aspx

Anaheim, CA

(photo credit: tripadvisor.com) 

This week's City of Orange County is Anaheim, CA. According to Wikipedia:

Founded by fifty German families in 1857 and incorporated as the second city in Los Angeles County on February 10, 1870, Anaheim developed into an industrial center, producing electronics, aircraft parts and canned fruit. It is the site of theDisneyland Resort, a world-famous grouping of theme parks and hotels which opened in 1955, Angel Stadium of Anaheim, Honda Center and Anaheim Convention Center, the largest convention center on the West Coast. Its name is ablend of "Ana", after the nearby Santa Ana River, and "heim", a common German place name compound originally meaning "home".^[4]

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anaheim,_California

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Famous Face From Orange County: NASA Astronaut Joseph M. Acaba

Photo Credit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Joseph_Acaba_v2.jpg

This week's Famous Face From Orange County is a Joseph Michael Acaba who is an educator, hydrogeologist, and NASA astronaut. Although Acaba is not from Orange County, he is currently an Anaheim resident. Here's what Wikipedia has to say about him:

Joseph Michael "Joe" Acaba (born May 17, 1967) is an educator, hydrogeologist, andNASA astronaut.^[1][2] In May 2004 he became the first person of Puerto Rican heritage to be named as a NASA astronaut candidate, when he was selected as a member of NASA Astronaut Training Group 19.^[3] He completed his training on February 10, 2006 and was assigned to STS-119, which flew from March 15 to March 28, 2009 to deliver the final set of solar arrays to the International Space Station.^[4] Acaba served as a Flight Engineer aboard the International Space Station, having launched on May 15, 2012.^[5] He arrived at the space station on May 17 and returned to Earth on September 17, 2012 at 6:53am Moscow Standard Time when touchdown was officially recorded by the Russian Federal Space Agency.^[6][7]

Have you seen any famous people in orange County?  Let us know in the comments! Be sure to "like" us on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/mylocaloc and follow us on Twitter: @mylocaloc.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Joseph_Acaba_v2.jpg