In response to my post about his Rancho Santa Margarita book, author Mike Moodian writes, "Yes, the book does cover the histories of two separate places. The reason for this is because the histories of Rancho Santa Margarita, Rancho Mission Viejo and Rancho Trabuco are intertwined. My approach with this book is (1) to focus on the ranch history of southeast Orange County/north San Diego County, and (2) to demonstrate the connection between the ranch heritage of the region and the current City of Rancho Santa Margarita. ...To tell the story of the city of RSM, one must first focus on the ranch heritage of the region..."
The photo at the top of today's post shows cowboys on the actual Rancho Santa Margarita (now part of Camp Pendleton) sometime around the 1930s. The photo immediately above is from a groundbreaking in what is now the city of Rancho Santa Margarita. According to Moodian, the folks in the lineup include (L to R) Michael Harris, Douglas Avery, Alice O'Neill Avery, an unidentified priest, Richard J. O'Neill, Melinda Moiso, Anthony Moiso, Tom Blum and Gilbert Aguirre..
This being Black History Month, it's especially appropriate that Bob Johnson will discuss his collection of oral histories, A Different Shade of Orange, at the Fullerton Public Library, on Feb. 23, 7-9pm.
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The Boy Scouts are celebrating 100 years of scouting in Orange County, a event which, as I mentioned earlier, has also been commemorated with a book by Phil Brigandi.
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To wrap up their centennial year, the City of Huntington Beach buried a time capsule at City Hall on Wednesday.
The photograph of the groundbreaking in Rancho Santa Margarita is (more likely than not)for Santa Margarita High School in the mid-1980s.
ReplyDeleteFr. Mike Harris was the first principal and the unnamed priest is Monsignor Michael Driscoll, who later was ordained a bishop in Orange County.
Tony Moiso donated the land for the school, which explains the rest of the O'Neill/Moiso clan.