In This World Series Matchup, ‘Southern L.A.’ Will Take On ‘West Oakland’

Has Giants manager Dusty Baker fired up Orange County or what? As his team prepared to meet the Anaheim Angels in the World Series, Baker said: “Our focus is ‘Beat L.A.’ ” Then he compounded the insult by saying of Anaheim: “It’s Southern L.A.” I was reminded of the time that Bob Dole praised the “Brooklyn Dodgers” for a victory during the 1996 presidential campaign.

One irritated Orange County resident, speaking for his region, asked KSPN-AM (1110) radio host Todd Donoho: “Are we that lowly?”

I don’t mind if Baker refers to Anaheim as Southern L.A. I’ve always thought of San Francisco as West Oakland, anyway.

In Baker’s defense: The Angels did play in L.A. for two years before moving to Anaheim after the 1964 season. Even in Orange County, they were called the “California Angels” for years because team officials apparently feared no one else in the nation had heard of Anaheim (except, possibly, those few folks who had visited Disneyland).

Anaheim Gets No Respect -- the Early Years: The city was part of L.A. County until Orange County was created in 1889. The folks in Anaheim, Santa Ana and Fullerton complained at the time that they were being ignored by L.A. City Hall (sound familiar, Valley secessionists?).

The book, “A Hundred Years of Yesterdays,” said that one of the reasons Orange County seceded was that the area’s only rolled fire hose was kept in L.A.

Back to Northern L.A.: “I knew that some people considered Angelenos to be plastic, but who could have guessed this?” wrote Tony Gleeson, enclosing a shot of a shop window in Glendale (see photo).

Not an entirely hairy situation: A while back, this column showed a 19th century snapshot of the “LAPD Strong Men” group, which participated in boxing, wrestling and weightlifting competitions. I noted that the big men also had big mustaches.

But a reader pointed out that the police officer in the first row, far right, was clean-shaven (see partial photo) and offered a theory as to why: “My late brother, a policeman in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, once showed me a picture of the CR police force, circa early 1900s, with the same [exception].”

The explanation was that the “youngest man on the force could not wear a mustache.”

It’s that time of year: With Halloween approaching, Ed Foran of Santa Monica sent along a shot of a party shop’s frightening jumpers (see photo), while Diana Van Horn of Fountain Valley came upon the novel idea of making your wrinkles go away by saying “boo” to them (see accompanying).

MiscelLAny: In the 1994 movie “Angels in the Outfield,” about a heaven-sent helper who turns the Angels into winners, many of the shots of the team’s home games were actually shot in Oakland. Sorry about that, Anaheim.

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Steve Harvey can be reached at (800) LA-TIMES, Ext. 77083, by fax at (213) 237-4712, by mail at Metro, L.A. Times, 202 W. 1st St., L.A. 90012 and by e-mail at steve.harvey@latimes.com.