Imperial (209 page)

Although it was the ninth-largest county in the state, only one-half of one percent of Californians lived there —Figures from California State Board of Equalization (1949), pp. 13-14.

A chubby little plane which wears our American flag and the twin legends TRANS WORLD AIRWAYS and LOS ANGELES AIRWAYS . . .—California State Archives. Olson Photo Collection. Accession #94-06-27 (1-237). Location: C 5266. Box 1 of 7. Folder 94-06-27 (48-53): Aviation: Commercial. Photograph #94-06-27- 0048.

Description of “the sea-edge of Los Angeles at midcentury”—Loc. cit., photo #94-06-27-0050 N.

The Salton Sea, “235 feet below sea level,” etc.—ICHSPM document. Ball Advertising Co., p. 4.

“About the same as the ocean”—Shields Date Gardens, p. 21.

Launching facilities for power boats; number of visitors to Salton Sea
vs.
Yosemite—Ainsworth, p. 256.

“Low barometric pressure and greater water density . . .”—
National Motorist
, January-February 1950 (vol. and no. unavailable), p. 8 (Evelyn Slack Gist, “Paradox of the Colorado Desert”).

The booster from 1962: “At our little desert hideaway near Mecca . . .”—Ibid., p. 98.

“They had a house of crystal pillars on the planet Mars . . .”—Bradbury, p. 2.

“Salton City, a bustling young community of modern homes”—ICHSPM document. Ball Advertising Co., p. 14.

Rothko: “A picture is not its color . . .”—Breslin, p. 201 (draft manifesto with Adolph Gottleib, 1943).

A civic booster: “One of the great sagas of the Old West took place in the twentieth century . . .”—Laflin,
Coachella Valley
, p. 35.

Edgar F. Howe, 1910: “We can see today more clearly the possibility of building a new Egypt . . .”—Howe and Hall, p. 5.

“From the air, the Coachella Valley looks much like the Imperial . . .”—Griffin and Young, pp. 166-67.

Brawley, “Where it’s Sun-Day every day!”—ICHSPM document. Ball Advertising Co., p. 4.

Description of Calexico and various fiestas—Ibid., p. 5.

The President of the Imperial Valley Pioneers: “Imperial Valley is more than a highly-developed farming area . . .” —Harris, p. 7 (note by Seth Grimes, 1956).

Retail sales and income for civilian residents had both more than tripled . . .—After information in California State Board of Equalization (1949), pp. 15, 21. For exact figures, see chronology for 1939 and 1947. The 1940 and 1948 income figures (see chronology) and 1950 figure on agriculture as percentage of income are from the
California Blue Book
(1950), p. 854.

The 1950 annual Brawley picnic—ICHSPM photograph, cat. #P94.9.1, 1-57. Date and place given on caption.

Water requirements to produce one pound of beef—
State of California Atlas
, p. 1. (Note: This is a 1975 figure. It is possible, but not likely, that the 1950 figure would have been different. If so, it might well have been even higher, given the freedom with which Imperial County spent its water allotment.)

Imperial County’s percentage of California’s locally assessed tangible property values remained one-third lower than it had been before the Depression.—After California State Board of Equalization (1949), p. 16. The figures were: 0.65% for 1929, 0.72% for 1933, 0.43% for around 1947.

Proportional shares of county inheritance taxes collected in 1950—[California State Controller (1950-51).] Statement no. 10 (Amounts Each County Contributed to Certain Receipts During the Fiscal Year Ended June 30, 1951), p. 198. Inheritance taxes collected by counties were: Los Angeles $9,291,911.89, San Diego $961,383.46, Riverside $164,426.58, Imperial $24,329.44, with California’s total being $20,371,028.51.

A man who’d worked for the Bureau of Reclamation from 1948 to 1950 . . .—This was Mr. Herb Cilch, interviewed by WTV in San Diego in June 2003.

Simone de Beauvoir: “It is because of the abstract climate in which they live . . .”—
The Annals of America
, vol. 16, p. 545 (“Goodbye to America,” from
America Day by Day
, French ed. 1948, English ed. 1952).

Lettuce was the most lucrative crop at twenty-five million dollars.—Information from
California Blue Book
(1950), pp. 851-52.

Herbert Marcuse, 1955: “The sacrifice of libido for culture has paid off well . . .”—Op. cit., pp. 3-4.

Increase in Imperial Valley carrot-production norm—
California Farmer
, vol. 193, no. 1 (July 1, 1950), p. 6 (“Agricultural News Notes of the Pacific Coast: Southern California”).

“Cut this phase of the labor by a third”—
California Farmer
, vol. 193, no. 1 (July 1, 1950), p. 9 (“Saving Labor in the Orchard”).

B. A. Harrigan writes: “I wish to emphasize that these values are
Gross
Values . . .”—Imperial County Agricultural Commission papers, 1950. Cover letter to the Honorable Board of Supervisors and the State Director of Agriculture.

The 1950 high school commencement program at Wilson School—ICHSPM, document cat. #A99.13.12. Brochure: “Commencement: Wilson School, June 7, 1950, El Centro, California.”

Alice Woodside—Interviewed in Sacramento, February 2004.

Carrots (whose high commodity status was a postwar phenomenon)—Richard Brogan, interviewed in Calexico, April 2004.

Alfalfa as number-1 Imperial crop, 1951—Imperial Valley Directory (1952), p. 15.

Kay Brockman Bishop—Interviewed December 2006 on her ranch just west of Calexico. Terrie Petree was present.

An oldtimer: “We had citrus here . . .”—Richard Brogan, same interview.

Cotton acreages, 1951-53—Imperial County Agricultural Commission papers. B. A. Harrigan, Agricultural Commissioner, annual reports for those years. No cotton listed for 1950.

Footnote: W. F. Holt’s obituary—
San Rafael Independent Journal
, 24 November 1951, p. 3.

The cotton goddess of 1952—
Imperial County: The Big Picture
, p. 32.

“Orange groves, cotton—new houses . . .”—Kerouac (Brinkley), p. 359 (“Boomin to Yuma”).

Former County Agricultural Commissioner on international cooperation against capra beetles—Claude Finnell, interviewed in his home in El Centro, April 2004. Shannon Mullen was present.

Imperial County Assessor’s office: “The flourishing fields and the mile-long trains . . .”—California State Board of Equalization (1949), p. 52.

California Blue Book
: “Imperial’s warm, sunny winters . . .” and “immense green-gold garden”—Op. cit. (1950 ed.), p. 851.

Zulema Rashid’s recollections—From 3 interviews in the Sweet Temptations Coffee Shop in summer 2003. Larry McCaffery was present for the third interview. I asked Zulema why she had chosen to become an accountant, and she said: “Just a couple of months before graduation my mother had an accident and she lost an arm. When I was in L.A. with her for rehab, I went to business college because I wanted to be Perry Mason’s secretary, but then there was another terrible accident and my father lost his life.”

The two extracts from
The Real Causes of Our Migrant Problem
: “If there’s one thing I’m certain of . . .” and “It’s a sad change that has come over our farm owners . . .”—Sanders, pp. 18, 56.

Richard Brogan: “The nature of the American farmer is that it’s a forthright, inquisitive mind . . .”—Same interview in Calexico, April 2004.

Kay Brockman Bishop—Interview at her ranch, 2006.

The mid-1960s doings of “Imperial Valley, the big, sunny, windy Algeria of the ‘Southland’”—Lilliard, pp. 87-88.

Local woman: “Why did they come here? Why did they stay? . . .”—Harris, p. 6 (dedication, January 1956).

Imperial is bird-hunting in the tules along the south shore of the Salton Sea.—Information from
National Motorist
, January-February 1950 (vol. and no. unavailable), p. 9 (Evelyn Slack Gist, “Paradox of the Colorado Desert”).

B. A. Harrigan: “No other area in the U.S. can produce any more crops per acre . . .”—
Imperial Valley Press
, vol. 103, no. 27, Tuesday, June 10, 2003, p. A4 (“Stories of the Past: 50 years ago”).

Honey production, 1950—Imperial County Agricultural Commission papers. B. A. Harrigan, Agricultural Commissioner, annual report for 1950, unnumbered p. 2.

“At Calexico it was Christmas shopping time on Main Street . . .”—Kerouac,
The Dharma Bums
, p. 94.

Richard Campbell’s lettuce memories—California State Archives. Department of Food and Agriculture. Bureau of Marketing. Marketing order files, Box 3. State of California, Department of Agriculture, Bureau of Markets hearing on proposed marketing order for winter lettuce. Wednesday, December 17, 1958, beginning ten o’clock, a.m., El Centro, California. P. 393.

Imperial at midcentury is number one among California counties for carbon dioxide production.—California State Board of Equalization (1949), p. 13.

Image of the “Cavalcade Parade”—ICHSPM photograph, cat. #P95.30.23.

108 . There Was Always Food on the Table (1950 s)

Stella Mendoza—Interviewed at her kitchen table in Brawley, October 2003.

109 . Coachella (1950)

Epigraph: “. . . the road was anisotropic . . .”—Strugatski and Strugatski, p. 204.

Coachella green corn acreage estimate for 1947—California State Archives. Department of Food and Agriculture. Bureau of Marketing. Marketing order files, Box 4. State of California, Department of Agriculture, Bureau of Markets hearing on proposed marketing order for Coachella Valley green corn. Wednesday, April 9, 1947, 10:15 o’clock, a.m., Coachella Valley Water District Building, Coachella, California. P. 6.

Footnote: Irrigated areas, 563,000—Griffin and Young, p. 166.

Interview with Mr. and Mrs. La Londe—July 2004, in their home in Coachella. Shannon Mullen was present.

Footnote: Distinction between Coachella and Imperial soils—Dunham, p. 108; Griffin and Young, p. 181.

“America’s Garden of Allah”—Dunham, unnumbered endpaper map.

Carolyn Cooke’s recollections—Telephone interview, Coachella, April 2004.

Photograph of weed-control boat—ICHSPM photograph, cat. #P92.34.3 (Don Chandler photo, August 1952, Caterpillar Diesel D311 Marine Engine).

Photograph of Preston Ranch, 1904—ICHSPM photograph, cat. number illegible.

Coachella
vs.
Palo Verde, 1952-53—Paul, p. 50 (expressing these ratios as absolute numbers in thousands of dollars).

Footnote on R.M.C. Fullenwider—Fitch, p. 273.

“The scientifically clean dates . . .” and accompanying photograph—Dunham pp. 100, 101 (illustration, “METICULOUSLY CLEAN AND EFFICIENT PACKING HOUSES PROCESS THE DATES FOR MARKET”).

C. H. Hollis, 1947—California State Archives. Department of Food and Agriculture. Bureau of Marketing. Marketing-order files, Box 4. State of California, Department of Agriculture, Bureau of Markets hearing on proposed marketing order for Coachella Valley green corn. Wednesday, April 9, 1947, 10:15 o’clock, a.m., Coachella Valley Water District Building, Coachella, California. P. 43.

Gifford Price, 1957—California State Archives. Department of Food and Agriculture. Bureau of Marketing. Marketing-order files, Box 4. State of California, Department of Agriculture, Bureau of Markets hearing on proposed marketing order for desert area green corn. Tuesday, March 18, 1954, 10:00 o’clock, a.m., Coachella Valley Water District Building. Pp. 57, 63-64.

Douglass Nance—Ibid., pp. 17, 28.

Paul Sandoval—Ibid., p. 31.

J. L. Mapes in Indio—Ibid., pp. 42, 44, 41.

“Agriculture was long the chief source of income in the Coachella . . .”—Griffin and Young, p. 166.

“How fortunate we are in planting our grove at this late date . . .”—Dunham, pp. 77-78.

Need for tile drains—Griffin and Young, p. 189.

Population, agricultural economic figures on Riverside County 1940-50, including quoted remarks on the Coachella Valley and Corona—
California Blue Book
, pp. 936-37, 940. Summing up, the main crops in Coachella’s deserts were dates, grapefruits, grapes, alfalfa, cotton and vegetables. I expect that you’ll probably want to know how citrus was doing in Riverside County, so let me inform you that in 1940 it was valued at $8,997,468 and by 1949 it was up to $16,332,980. “Corona is the lemon center of the citrus belt,” but Corona, unfortunately, lies outside of Imperial.

110 . Riverside (1950)

Epigraph: “Confidence in the continued growth of Riverside’s wealth . . .”—Riverside City Directory (1951), p. 8.

“It took exactly the entire twenty-five miles to get out of the smog of Los Angeles . . .”—Kerouac,
The Dharma Bums
, p. 91. My assumption that the words were written in 1956 (the publication date is 1958) derives from that date’s appearance in the text.

Footnote: County directory on distance of Riverside from L.A.—Riverside City Directory (1951), p. 9.

Beginning of Riverside smog—Patterson, p. 473.

Riverside City slogan—Riverside City Directory (1951), p. 9.

Survival of one original navel orange tree and “Riverside is an ideal residential community . . .”—Ibid., p. 10.

Description of the Ramona Freeway from above—After a photo in Wagner and Blackstock, p. 21.

“Opening the door of suburbia . . .”—Ibid., p. 13.

1950 as beginning of new building boom in Riverside—Patterson, p. 411.

Riverside City statistics, 1950—Riverside City Directory (1951), p. 9.

Description of the street called Lemon—Ibid., pp. 587-88.

Information on citrus grove realtors, the J. H. Jeter Co. and Alger J. Fast—Ibid.; in Buyers’ Guide sec., pp. 700, 19, 4.

The Riverside Holts—Ibid., p. 226.

“Predominating nationalities in the city are American and Mexican.”—Ibid., p. 9.

Data on the Angels, Acosta and Aguilar—pp. 25, 14, 16.

Anglo names and occupations—Ibid., pp. 227, 439.

“Foreign” names and occupations—Ibid., pp. 16, 526 (the very last residential entry).

“ . . . today Riverside is the center of the Citrus Empire . . .”—Ibid., p. 9.

“Ontario is ideally situated in the heart of the citrus belt . . .” and following description of Ontario—Ontario City Directory (1945-46), p. 13.