Portal:California

California
California
State
	State of California
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	Map of the United States with California highlighted

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Welcome to the Portal:California. Such a lovely place.

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P:CAL

California (/ˌkælɪˈfɔːrnjə/) is a state in the Western United States that lies on the Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares an international border with the Mexican state of Baja California to the south. With over 39 million residents across an area of 163,696 square miles (423,970 km²), it is the most populous U.S. state, the third-largest by area, and the most populated subnational entity in North America.

Prior to European colonization, California was one of the most culturally and linguistically diverse areas in pre-Columbian North America. European exploration in the 16th and 17th centuries led to the colonization by the Spanish Empire. The area became a part of Mexico in 1821, following its successful war for independence, but was ceded to the United States in 1848 after the Mexican–American War. The California gold rush started in 1848 and led to social and demographic changes, including depopulation of Indigenous tribes. The western portion of Alta California was then organized and admitted as the 31st state in 1850, as a free state, following the Compromise of 1850.

The economy of California is the largest of any U.S. state, with an estimated 2024 gross state product of $4.132 trillion as of Q3 2024. It is the world's largest sub-national economy; by most estimations, if it were a country on its own, it would be the fifth-largest economy in the world (putting it, as of 2025, behind Japan and ahead of India) when ranked by nominal GDP. The state's agricultural industry also leads the nation in agricultural output, led by its production of dairy, almonds, and grapes. With the busiest port in the country (Los Angeles), California plays a pivotal role in the global supply chain, hauling in about 40% of goods imported to the US. Notable contributions to popular culture, ranging from entertainment, sports, music, and fashion, have their origins in California. The Los Angeles area is seen as the center of the U.S. film industry; the area is the home of Hollywood, the oldest and one of the largest film industries in the world, profoundly influencing global entertainment. The San Francisco Bay's Silicon Valley is seen as the center of the global technology industry. (Full article...)

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Griffith Observatory in September 2006

Griffith Observatory is located in Los Angeles, California, United States. Sitting on the south-facing slope of Mount Hollywood in L.A.'s Griffith Park, it commands a view of the Los Angeles Basin, including downtown Los Angeles to the southeast, Hollywood to the south, and the Pacific Ocean to the southwest. The observatory is a popular tourist attraction that features an extensive array of space- and science-related displays.

The land on which the observatory stands was donated to the City of Los Angeles by Col. Griffith J. Griffith in 1896. In his will, Griffith donated funds to build an observatory, exhibit hall, and planetarium on the donated land. Construction began on June 20, 1933 using a design developed by architect John C. Austin based on preliminary sketches by Russell W. Porter. The observatory and accompanying exhibits were opened to the public on May 14, 1935. (Full article...)

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The following are images from various California-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1General Richard Barnes Mason was the longest serving U.S. Military Governor of California (1847–1849), overseeing California's transition into statehood. (from History of California)
Image 2Gaspar de Portolá served as the first Governor of the Californias and led the famed Portolá expedition of 1769-70. (from History of California)
Image 3The 1562 map of the Americas, created by Spanish cartographer Diego Gutiérrez, which applied the name California for the first time. (from History of California)
Image 4Concord Coach no. 251 in Wells Fargo livery in Old Town San Diego. (from History of California)
Image 5Depiction of the 1755 revolt of the Mission Indians against padre Luis Jayme at Mission San Diego de Alcalá. (from History of California)
Image 6Poppies, Antelope Valley, a California Impressionist painting by Benjamin Chambers Brown (from Culture of California)
Image 7Mission San Francisco Solano, founded in 1823 by order of Governor Luis Antonio Argüello, was the last Californian mission established. (from History of California)
Image 8California was often depicted as an island, due to the Baja California peninsula, from the 16th to the 18th centuries, such as in this 1650 map by cartographer Johannes Vingboons. (from History of California)
Image 9The Vallecitos stop of the Butterfield Overland Mail, in Julian, California. (from History of California)
Image 10Map of Spain's Manila galleon trade routes, showing routes between the Spanish East Indies and Acapulco passing along the coast of California. (from History of California)
Image 11Juan Bautista de Anza led the 1774-76 Anza Expeditions. (from History of California)
Image 12While slavery was abolished in California by Mexican authorities in 1829, the first California State Legislature under U.S. statehood passed the 1850 Indian Indenture Act, which allowed for the forced labor of indigenous Californians by Americans. (from History of California)
Image 13San Francisco harbor, c. 1850–51. (from History of California)
Image 14A Southern Pacific Train at Arcade Depot, Los Angeles, 1891 (from History of California)
Image 15Balthazar, Inhabitant of Northern California, an 1818 portrait of a Miwok man by artist Mikhail Tikhanov. (from History of California)
Image 16California's first State Capitol building in San Jose, which served as the capital of California 1850–51. (from History of California)
Image 17Dividing the Light (2007), a skyspace by James Turrell at Pomona College (from Culture of California)
Image 18The University of California, Berkeley is the flagship school of the University of California system. (from Culture of California)
Image 19Flag of Company A (The California 100) during the U.S. Civil War. (from History of California)
Image 20The 1846 Bear Flag Revolt declared the California Republic and prefaced the American conquest of California. (from History of California)
Image 21The Treaty of Cahuenga, signed at the Campo de Cahuenga in 1847 by Californio general Andrés Pico and American general John C. Frémont, proclaimed a ceasefire under an American victory. The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, signed a year later in 1848, officially ended the Mexican–American War and formally ceded Alta California to the United States. (from History of California)
Image 22The Spanish founded Mission San Juan Capistrano in 1776, the third to be established of the Californian missions. (from History of California)
Image 23Advertisement for sailing to California, c. 1850. (from History of California)
Image 24The Battle of Río San Gabriel, in 1847, was a decisive victory for the American campaign in Alta California. (from History of California)
Image 25Map of the Butterfield Overland Mail routes through California, c. 1858. (from History of California)
Image 26Founded by Vicente Francisco de Sarría in 1817, Mission San Rafael Arcángel, was the last mission founded during the Spanish period. (from History of California)
Image 27Mission San Gabriel Arcángel, founded in 1771 by padres Pedro Benito Cambón and Ángel de la Somera. (from History of California)
Image 28Presidio of Santa Barbara. (from Culture of California)
Image 29Joaquín Murrieta, called the "Robin Hood of California", was a notorious outlaw during the California Gold Rush. He served as inspiration for Zorro, the famed Californian bandit-hero. (from History of California)
Image 30Angustias de la Guerra played a crucial role in defending women's property rights during the drafting of the Constitution of California. (from History of California)
Image 31Junípero Serra conducting the first mass in Monterey Bay in 1770. (from History of California)
Image 32Mission San Carlos Borromeo de Carmelo, established in 1770, was the headquarters of the Californian mission system from 1797 until 1833. (from History of California)
Image 33Bilingual English-Spanish sign in the Colorado Desert of Southern California. (from Culture of California)
Image 34Map of the route taken by the Anza Expedition of 1775–76, from the Presidio of Tubac to San Francisco Bay. (from History of California)
Image 35In-N-Out burgers (from Culture of California)
Image 36Goldfields in the Sierra Nevada and Shasta Cascade. (from History of California)
Image 37Francis Drake's 1579 landing in "New Albion" (modern-day Point Reyes); engraving by Theodor De Bry, 1590. (from History of California)
Image 38The Petaluma Adobe, built by General Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo in 1836 on Rancho Petaluma. (from History of California)
Image 39Pacheco Adobe, built 1835 by Salvio Pacheco on Rancho Monte del Diablo. (from History of California)
Image 40Presidio of San Francisco, founded by José Joaquín Moraga in 1776. (from History of California)
Image 41Bodega y Quadra led a 1775 expedition along the coast of California into the Pacific Northwest. (from History of California)
Image 42Depiction of the California hide trade. (from History of California)
Image 43Depiction of the Donner Party heading west on the California Trail. (from History of California)
Image 44The railway station in Sacramento in 1874. (from History of California)
Image 45The Getty Villa (from Culture of California)
Image 46General Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo reviewing his troops in Sonoma in 1846. (from History of California)
Image 47Between 1846 and 1873, U.S. government agents waged an extermination campaign against Indigenous Californians, known as the California genocide, resulting in as many as 100,000 deaths. (from History of California)
Image 48SS California (1848), the first paddle steamer to steam between Panama City and San Francisco, as part of the Pacific Mail Steamship Company. (from History of California)
Image 49"Independent Gold Hunter on His Way to California", c. 1850 (from History of California)
Image 50Manuel Domínguez built Domínguez Adobe on Rancho San Pedro in 1826. (from History of California)
Image 51The American capture of San Diego by the USS Cyane in 1846 (from History of California)
Image 52Mission Santa Barbara, founded in 1786, was the first mission to be established by Fermín de Lasuén. (from History of California)
Image 53The colonial coat of arms of the Californias, granted by Antonio de Mendoza, the first Viceroy of New Spain. (from History of California)
Image 54The Battle of San Pasqual in 1846. (from History of California)
Image 55The 1835 Manifiesto a la República Mejicana, by José Figueroa, was the first book published in California (from Culture of California)
Image 56Stanford University Oval (from Culture of California)
Image 57Portrait of an "assimilated" Maidu man in Sacramento, 1867. (from History of California)
Image 58Forces raising the U.S. flag over the Monterey Customhouse following their victory at the Battle of Monterey (from History of California)
Image 59Portrait of a Californio in traditional vaquero clothing. Californios benefitted immensely by the establishment of the ranchos of California, following the Mexican secularization act of 1833. (from History of California)

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Certainly being in California has encouraged a sustained commitment to rethinking the nature, purposes, and relevance of the contemporary arts, specifically music, for a society which by and large seems to manage quite well without them.

— Brian Ferneyhough

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Image 1

Meyer in 1996 (photo by Roger Ebert)

Russell Albion Meyer (March 21, 1922 – September 18, 2004) was an American filmmaker. He was primarily known for writing and directing a successful series of sexploitation films featuring campy humor, sly satire and large-breasted women, which have attracted a considerable cult following. His best-known works include Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! (1965), Vixen! (1968), Supervixens (1975), Beneath the Valley of the Ultra-Vixens (1979), and the film he considered to be his definitive work, Beyond the Valley of the Dolls (1970). (Full article...)
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Le Guin in 1995

Ursula Kroeber Le Guin (/ˈkroʊbər lə ˈɡwɪn/ KROH-bər lə GWIN; née Kroeber; October 21, 1929 – January 22, 2018) was an American author. She is best known for her works of speculative fiction, including science fiction works set in her Hainish universe, and the Earthsea fantasy series. Her work was first published in 1959, and her literary career spanned nearly sixty years, producing more than twenty novels and over a hundred short stories, in addition to poetry, literary criticism, translations, and children's books. Frequently described as an author of science fiction, Le Guin has also been called a "major voice in American Letters". Le Guin said she would prefer to be known as an "American novelist".

Le Guin was born in Berkeley, California, to author Theodora Kroeber and anthropologist Alfred Louis Kroeber. Having earned a master's degree in French, Le Guin began doctoral studies but abandoned these after her marriage in 1953 to historian Charles Le Guin. She began writing full-time in the late 1950s and achieved major critical and commercial success with A Wizard of Earthsea (1968) and The Left Hand of Darkness (1969), which have been described by Harold Bloom as her masterpieces. For the latter volume, Le Guin won both the Hugo and Nebula awards for best novel, becoming the first woman to do so. Several more works set in Earthsea or the Hainish universe followed; others included books set in the fictional country of Orsinia, several works for children, and many anthologies. (Full article...)
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Downey in 2014

Robert John Downey Jr. (born April 4, 1965), also known as RDJ, is an American actor. His films as a leading actor have grossed over $14 billion worldwide, making him one of the highest-grossing actors of all time. In 2008, Downey was named by Time magazine as one of the 100 most influential people in the world. From 2013 to 2015, he was listed by Forbes as Hollywood's highest-paid actor. His accolades include a Golden Globe Award, BAFTA Award, Academy Award, and nominations for two Primetime Emmy Awards.

At the age of five, Downey made his acting debut in his father Robert Downey Sr.'s 1970 film Pound. He subsequently worked with the Brat Pack in the teen films Weird Science (1985) and Less than Zero (1987). Downey's portrayal of Charlie Chaplin in the 1992 biopic Chaplin garnered him a BAFTA Award for Best Actor and his first Academy Award nomination. Following a stint at the Corcoran Substance Abuse Treatment Facility on drug charges, he joined the TV series Ally McBeal in 2000 and won a Golden Globe Award for the role. Downey was fired from the show in 2001 in the wake of additional drug charges. He stayed in a court-ordered drug treatment program and has maintained his sobriety since 2003. (Full article...)
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Barbera in 1993

Joseph Roland Barbera (/bɑːrˈbɛərə/ bar-BAIR-ə; Italian: [barˈbɛːra]; March 24, 1911 – December 18, 2006) was an American animator and cartoonist, best known as the co-founder of the animation studio Hanna-Barbera.

Born to Italian immigrants in New York City, Barbera joined Van Beuren Studios in 1927 and subsequently Terrytoons in 1936. In 1937, he moved to California, and while working at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), Barbera met William Hanna. The two men began a collaboration that was at first best known for producing Tom and Jerry. (Full article...)
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Gyllenhaal in 2019

Jacob Benjamin Gyllenhaal (/ˈdʒɪlənhɔːl/ JIL-ən-hawl, Swedish: [ˈjʏ̂lːɛnˌhɑːl]; born December 19, 1980) is an American actor who has worked on screen and stage for over thirty years. Born into the Gyllenhaal family, he is the son of film director Stephen Gyllenhaal and screenwriter Naomi Foner, and the younger brother of actress Maggie Gyllenhaal. He began acting as a child, making his debut in City Slickers (1991), followed by roles in his father's films A Dangerous Woman (1993) and Homegrown (1998). His breakthrough roles were as Homer Hickam in the biopic October Sky (1999) and a troubled teenager in the thriller Donnie Darko (2001). Gyllenhaal expanded to big-budget films with a starring role in the 2004 disaster film The Day After Tomorrow.

Gyllenhaal played Jack Twist in Ang Lee's 2005 romantic drama Brokeback Mountain, for which he won a BAFTA Award and was nominated for an Academy Award. His career progressed with starring roles in the thriller Zodiac (2007), the romantic comedy Love & Other Drugs (2010), and the science fiction film Source Code (2011). Further acclaim came with his roles in Denis Villeneuve's thrillers Prisoners (2013) and Enemy (2013), and he received nominations for the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role for his performances as a manipulative journalist in Nightcrawler (2014) and a troubled writer in Nocturnal Animals (2016). His highest-grossing release came with the Marvel Cinematic Universe superhero film Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019), in which he portrayed Mysterio. After playing a supporting role in the drama Wildlife (2018), Gyllenhaal starred in action or thriller projects, including the films The Guilty (2021), Ambulance (2022) and Road House (2024), as well as the series Presumed Innocent (2024). (Full article...)
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Official portrait, 1983

Nancy Davis Reagan (/ˈreɪɡən/; born Anne Frances Robbins; July 6, 1921 – March 6, 2016) was an American film actress who was the first lady of the United States from 1981 to 1989, as the second wife of President Ronald Reagan.

Reagan was born in New York City. After her parents separated, she lived in Maryland with an aunt and uncle for six years. When her mother remarried in 1929, she moved to Chicago and later was adopted by her mother's second husband. As Nancy Davis, she was a Hollywood actress in the 1940s and 1950s, starring in films such as The Next Voice You Hear..., Night into Morning, and Donovan's Brain. In 1952, she married Ronald Reagan, who was then president of the Screen Actors Guild. He had two children from his previous marriage to Jane Wyman, and he and Nancy had two children together. Nancy Reagan was the first lady of California when her husband was governor from 1967 to 1975, and she began to work with the Foster Grandparents Program. (Full article...)
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Seaborg in 1964

Glenn Theodore Seaborg (/ˈsiːbɔːrɡ/ SEE-borg; April 19, 1912 – February 25, 1999) was an American chemist whose involvement in the synthesis, discovery and investigation of ten transuranium elements earned him a share of the 1951 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. His work in this area also led to his development of the actinide concept and the arrangement of the actinide series in the periodic table of the elements.

Seaborg spent most of his career as an educator and research scientist at the University of California, Berkeley, serving as a professor, and, between 1958 and 1961, as the university's second chancellor. He advised ten US presidents—from Harry S. Truman to Bill Clinton—on nuclear policy and was Chairman of the United States Atomic Energy Commission from 1961 to 1971, where he pushed for commercial nuclear energy and the peaceful applications of nuclear science. Throughout his career, Seaborg worked for arms control. He was a signatory to the Franck Report and contributed to the Limited Test Ban Treaty, the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. He was a well-known advocate of science education and federal funding for pure research. Toward the end of the Eisenhower administration, he was the principal author of the Seaborg Report on academic science, and, as a member of President Ronald Reagan's National Commission on Excellence in Education, he was a key contributor to its 1983 report "A Nation at Risk". (Full article...)
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Official portrait, 2006

Edmund Gerald Brown Jr. (born April 7, 1938) is an American lawyer, author, and politician who served as the 34th and 39th governor of California from 1975 to 1983 and 2011 to 2019. A member of the Democratic Party, he was elected secretary of state of California in 1970; Brown later served as mayor of Oakland from 1999 to 2007 and attorney general of California from 2007 to 2011. He was both the oldest and sixth-youngest governor of California due to the 28-year gap between his second and third terms. Upon completing his fourth term in office, Brown became the fourth longest-serving governor in U.S. history, serving 16 years and 5 days in office.

Born in San Francisco, he is the son of Bernice Layne Brown and Pat Brown, who was the 32nd governor of California (1959–1967). After graduating from the University of California, Berkeley and Yale Law School, he practiced law and began his political career as a member of the Los Angeles Community College District Board of Trustees (1969–1971). He was elected to serve as the 23rd secretary of state of California from 1971 to 1975. At 36, Brown was elected to his first term as governor in 1974, making him the youngest California governor in 111 years. In 1978, he won his second term. During his governorship, Brown ran unsuccessfully as a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1976 and 1980. He declined to pursue a third term as governor in 1982, instead making an unsuccessful run for the United States Senate that same year, losing to San Diego mayor and future governor Pete Wilson. (Full article...)
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Wally Bill Hedrick (1928 – December 17, 2003) was a seminal American artist in the 1950s California counterculture, gallerist, and educator who came to prominence in the early 1960s. Hedrick's contributions to art include pioneering artworks in psychedelic light art, mechanical kinetic sculpture, junk/assemblage sculpture, Pop Art, and (California) Funk Art. Later in his life, he was a recognized forerunner in Happenings, Conceptual Art, Bad Painting, Neo-Expressionism, and image appropriation. Hedrick was also a key figure in the first important public manifestation of the Beat Generation when he helped to organize the Six Gallery Reading, and created the first artistic denunciation of American foreign policy in Vietnam. Wally Hedrick was known as an “idea artist” long before the label “conceptual art” entered the art world, and experimented with innovative use of language in art, at times resorting to puns. (Full article...)
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Milk in June 1978

Harvey Bernard Milk (May 22, 1930 – November 27, 1978) was an American politician and the first openly gay man to be elected to public office in California, as a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors.

Milk was born and raised in New York. He acknowledged his homosexuality in adolescence but secretly pursued sexual relationships well into adulthood. The counterculture of the 1960s caused him to shed many of his conservative views about individual freedom and sexual expression. Milk moved to San Francisco in 1972 and opened a camera store. Although he held an assortment of jobs and frequently changed addresses, he settled in the Castro, a neighborhood that was experiencing a mass immigration of gay men and lesbians. He ran for city supervisor in 1973, but the existing gay political establishment resisted him. Milk's campaign was compared to theater due to his personality, earning media attention and votes, although not enough to be elected. He campaigned again in the next two supervisor elections, dubbing himself the "Mayor of Castro Street". The voter response caused him to also run for the California State Assembly. Due to his growing popularity, he led the gay rights movement in battles against anti-gay initiatives. Milk was elected city supervisor in 1977 after San Francisco began to choose neighborhood representatives rather than city-wide ones. During Milk's almost eleven months in office, he sponsored a bill banning discrimination based on sexual orientation in public accommodations, housing, and employment. The Supervisors passed the bill by a vote of 11–1, and Mayor George Moscone signed it into law. On November 27, 1978, Milk and Moscone were assassinated by Dan White, a disgruntled former city supervisor who cast the sole vote against Milk's bill. (Full article...)
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McCloskey in 1969

Paul Norton "Pete" McCloskey Jr. (September 29, 1927 – May 8, 2024) was an American politician who represented San Mateo County, California, as a Republican in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1967 to 1983.

Born in Loma Linda, California, McCloskey pursued a legal career in Palo Alto, California, after graduating from Stanford Law School. He served in the Korean War as a member of the United States Marine Corps. For his service, he was awarded the Navy Cross and the Silver Star. He won election to the House of Representatives in 1967, defeating Shirley Temple in the Republican primary. He co-authored the 1973 Endangered Species Act. He unsuccessfully challenged President Richard Nixon in the 1972 Republican primaries on an anti-Vietnam War platform and was the first member of Congress to publicly call for President Nixon's resignation after the Saturday Night Massacre. (Full article...)
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Perry in 2024

Katheryn Elizabeth Hudson (born October 25, 1984), known professionally as Katy Perry, is an American singer, songwriter, and television personality. One of the world's best-selling music artists, she is known for her influence on pop music and her camp style, being dubbed the "Queen of Camp" by Vogue and Rolling Stone. The world's highest-paid female musician in 2015 and 2018, Billboard named her one of the greatest pop stars of the 21st century.

At 16, Perry released a gospel record titled Katy Hudson (2001) under Red Hill Records, which was commercially unsuccessful. She moved to Los Angeles at 17 to venture into secular music, and later adopted the stage name "Katy Perry" from her mother's maiden name. She recorded an album while signed to Columbia Records, but was dropped before signing to Capitol Records. Perry rose to fame with One of the Boys (2008), a pop rock record containing her debut single "I Kissed a Girl" and follow-up single "Hot n Cold", which reached number one and three on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 respectively. (Full article...)
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Young in 2002

John Watts Young (September 24, 1930 – January 5, 2018) was an American astronaut, naval officer and aviator, test pilot, and aeronautical engineer. He became the 9th person to walk on the Moon as commander of the Apollo 16 mission in 1972.

Before becoming an astronaut, Young received his Bachelor of Science degree in Aeronautical Engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology and joined the U.S. Navy. After serving at sea during the Korean War he became a naval aviator and graduated from the U.S. Naval Test Pilot School. As a test pilot, he set several world time-to-climb records. Young retired from the Navy in 1976 with the rank of captain. (Full article...)
Image 14

Official portrait, 1972

Richard Milhous Nixon (January 9, 1913 – April 22, 1994) was the 37th president of the United States, serving from 1969 until his resignation in 1974. A member of the Republican Party, he previously served as the 36th vice president under President Dwight Eisenhower from 1953 to 1961, and also as a representative and senator from California. His presidency saw the reduction of U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War, détente with the Soviet Union and China, the Apollo 11 Moon landing, and the establishment of the Environmental Protection Agency and Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Nixon's second term ended early when he became the only U.S. president to resign from office, as a result of the Watergate scandal.

Nixon was born into a poor family of Quakers in Yorba Linda, Southern California. He graduated from Whittier College with a Bachelor of Arts in 1934 and from Duke University with a Juris Doctor in 1937, practiced law in California, and then moved with his wife Pat to Washington, D.C., in 1942 to work for the federal government. After serving in the Naval Reserve during World War II, he was elected to the House of Representatives in 1946. His work on the Alger Hiss case established his reputation as a leading anti-communist. In 1950, he was elected to the Senate. Nixon was the running mate of Eisenhower, the Republican Party's presidential nominee in the 1952 and 1956 elections. Nixon served for eight years as vice president and his two terms saw an increase in the notability of the office. He narrowly lost the 1960 presidential election to John F. Kennedy. After his loss in the 1962 race for governor of California, he announced his retirement from politics. However, in 1968, he made another run for the presidency and narrowly defeated the Democratic incumbent vice president Hubert Humphrey. (Full article...)
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Horace Jeremiah "Jerry" Voorhis (April 6, 1901 – September 11, 1984) was an American politician and educator from California who served five terms in the United States House of Representatives from 1937 to 1947. A Democrat, he represented the 12th congressional district in Los Angeles County. He was the first political opponent of Richard M. Nixon, who defeated Voorhis for re-election in 1946 in a campaign cited as an example of Nixon's use of red-baiting during his political rise.

Voorhis was born in Kansas, but the family relocated frequently in his childhood. He earned a bachelor's degree from Yale University (where he was elected to the academic honor society Phi Beta Kappa) and a master's degree in education from Claremont Graduate School. In 1928, he founded the Voorhis School for Boys and became its headmaster. He retained the post into his congressional career. (Full article...)

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... that prior to his career in the CIA, Dick Linthicum played basketball at UCLA and became the university's first All-American in any sport?
... that Eastern Michigan's only bowl-game victory before defeating San Jose State in the 2022 Famous Idaho Potato Bowl was against San Jose State in the 1987 California Bowl?
... that it was Caltech experimental physicist Rana X. Adhikari's idea to build a gravitational-wave observatory in India?
... that the San Gregorio Fault comes ashore in only two places in northern California, one of which is between Pillar Point Bluff and Moss Beach?
... that in 1858, when 400 Black Americans experiencing discrimination in California resettled on Vancouver Island, clergyman Edward Cridge integrated Christ Church to welcome them?
... that Sonia Levitin was inspired to write Boom Town after reading about a California girl who baked $11,000 worth of pies during the Gold Rush?
... that the first Indian-American mayor of Fremont, California, succeeded its first female and first Asian-American mayor?
... that Cypress College basketball coach Don Johnson, who was an All-American at UCLA, developed two players with minimal experience who later played for his alma mater and set records in the NBA?

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Salt Point State Park

Credit: Dawn Endico

Salt Point State Park is a state park located in Sonoma County, California, United States. The park covers 6,000 acres (24 km²) on the coast of Northern California with 20 miles (32 km) of hiking trails and over six miles of a rough rocky coast line including Salt Point which protrudes into the Pacific Ocean.

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Credit: Phreakdigital

The Crystal Range is a small group of mountains located within the Desolation Wilderness in the U.S. state of California. It is a subrange of the Sierra Nevada. The highest and most southerly peak is Pyramid Peak at 9987 ft; Mount Agassiz is next north at 9967 ft, with Mount Price (9975 ft) rounding out the southern group of peaks. Tells Peak is the northernmost named peak in the range.

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Topics

Government of California

List of California state agencies • Association of Monterey Bay Area Governments • California Attorney General • California State Board of Education • CDF Aviation Management Program • CalPERS • California Air Resources Board • California Commission for Economic Development • California Department of Boating and Waterways • California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection • California Department of Insurance • California Insurance Commissioner election, 2006 • California Legislative Analyst's Office • California Military Department • California Public Utilities Commission • California Speaks • California State Lands Commission • California State Lottery • California executive branch • CaliforniaVolunteers • California State Capitol • List of California District Attorneys • Districts in California • State of California enterprise IT systems • Department of Fair Employment and Housing • California Geological Survey • Governor of California • 11-99 Foundation • California Institute for Regenerative Medicine • California Insurance Commissioner • Joint Powers Authority • Local Agency Formation Commission • Secretary of State of California • List of law enforcement agencies in California • California State Controller • California State Police • California Department of Transportation • California State Treasurer • Westlands Water District

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State facts

Nicknames: The Golden State
Capital: Sacramento
Total area: 163,696 mi²
- Land: 156,002 mi²
- Water: 7,694 mi²
Highest elevation: 14,505 ft (Mount Whitney)
Population 39,250,017 (2016 est)
Admission to the Union: September 9, 1850 (31^st)

State symbols:

Insect: California Dogface Butterfly
Bird: California Valley Quail
Fossil: Saber-toothed cat
Dance: West Coast Swing
Colors: Blue & Gold
Animal: California Grizzly Bear
Flower: California Poppy
Gem: Benitoite
Rock: Serpentine
Fish: California Golden Trout
Songs: I Love You, California
Tree: California Redwood
Mineral: Gold

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California

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Southern California • Los Angeles • San Francisco Bay Area • Santa Barbara County • California State Highways • California County Routes • University of California • California State University

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Subportals

Related portals

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Things you can do

Create Requested California Articles
Help assess articles supported by WikiProject California
Help suggest content for usage in this portal by using the archive links to obtain instructions
Write California-related topics if you see a redlink which is worthy of an article
Cleanup and expand stub-class articles relating to California