Thursday, July 30, 2015

Come to where the flavor is,... Mission Viejo!

Look! It's another great Mission Viejo promotional film from the 1970s! Watch for those Philip Morris product placements! (*cough!*)

What? You didn't know that the Mission Viejo Co. was once owned by an enormous tobacco company?

The Mission Viejo Co. was founded in 1963 by Donald Bren and the O'Neill family. Later, Bren sold his part of the company and bought the Irvine Co. instead. In 1969, Philip Morris invested in the Mission Viejo Co. and in 1972 they bought it outright. The company developed Mission Viejo, Aliso Viejo, and some communities in other states. The cancer people finally sold the company to developer J.F. Shea Co. in 1997.

(Previous Mission Viejo film posted here.)

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Quite a find which brings back memories of what the place looked like all those years ago. It's hard to imagine now but this was a community on the far outskirts of the metropolitan area. Commutes on I-5 and I-405 were reasonably quick and it was fun to experience the rolling hillsides and orange tree groves...you could even smell the blossoms with that 4/65 air conditioning system. I arrived in OC in the early 60s and left in the late 70s. But with parents still there, when I fly in I'm always looking out the window on approach to SNA, remembering how it was back then.

Irvine Cyclist said...

Great imagery. Love the part around the five minutes where they say "the people will come." Thanks for posting!

B. Erica. Boone, Santa Ana, CA said...

I love reminising about those rolling hills south county used to be. Our family frequented MV in '69-70 during one of the first phases - it was on a hill and had a laundry chute. Always thought that was cool. My parents didn't end up buying there because the "home buying center" allotment was too low and the quality of the drapes & carpet provided was not as good as the Lyon Homes in Cowan Heights. So we ended up here.
Regardless... excellent find! Love the video and thanks for sharing. Will show it to my dad.

retrocounty said...

Come to where the flavor is...Come to Marlboro Viejo