Did You Know?

* In the summer of 1885, 18-year-old James Irvine Jr., heir to the Irvine Ranch, and friend Harry Baechtel, who later founded the world’s largest civil engineering firm, rode high-wheel bicycles from San Francisco to San Diego. On the way, they stopped at the Irvine Ranch and Irvine got his first real look at the land that would one day be his. The photo above shows Irvine, left, and Baechtel riding in Santa Ana.

* David Hewes, who provided the golden spike used at Promontory Point, Utah, to mark completion of the first cross-country railroad in 1869, was one of the Irvine Ranch’s early neighbors. Hewes purchased land in El Modena, which is now in the city of Orange, in the 1880s.

* Aviation pioneer Glenn L. Martin, right, achieved the first successful airplane flight in California on the Irvine Ranch in 1909. He flew a plane of his own design 100 feet in 12 seconds at an altitude of 8 feet. Martin went on to found the Glenn L. Martin Co., a major supplier of U.S. warplanes during World War II. At left is James Irvine Jr.

* In 1923, an experiment conducted by Nobel laureate Albert A. Michelson on the Irvine Ranch provided the most accurate measure to date of the speed of light. The test, conducted in a milelong tube, helped verify Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity.

* Battle scenes for “All Quiet on the Western Front” were filmed on the Irvine Ranch in 1930. The Academy Award-winning film was based on Erich Maria Remarque’s novel about life in the trenches during World War I.

* Jamboree Road was built to provide access to the 1953 International Boy Scout Jamboree, below, which was the third such International Jamboree held in the United States. More than 50,000 Scouts camped on the ranch in about 36,000 tents for two weeks in July. A giant arena was constructed where more than 100,000 people watched a spectacular pageant of the West.

* Scenes for the movie “Planet of the Apes” were filmed at Library Plaza on the UC Irvine campus in 1968.

* In 1982, U.S. News and World Report listed Irvine as one of the 10 best places in the country to live.

Source: Irvine Historical Society