Southern California Dreamin', circa 1900
Written: Apr 22 '01 (Updated May 14 '01)
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Pros: Beautiful rendition of Southern California's citrus era. Beautiful park in its own right.
Cons: The underlying message is: "This is what we paved."
The Bottom Line: There's no better place to meet the magnificent trees of the genus Citrus, or to ponder the passing of the citrus age. Go ahead ... eat one!
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| Urbanist's Full Review: California Citrus State Historic Park |
Crucial Biographical Note: The author of this epinion was raised in Iowa and Oregon. He did not see California, or any subtropical landscape, until the age of 14, in 1976. The feelings of amazement he had at this age do not seem to have faded, even though he later lived in California for 14 years. As a result, this epinion may contain unexamined outbursts of childlike amazement that may be inexplicable to you if you grew up in subtropical lands.
In 1849, the California Dream was gold. By 1949, it was film. But halfway between these another great California dream swept across America: In 1900 or so, California was being sold as a low-cost paradise, founded on a fragrant and bountiful tree that most Americans had never seen. If The Graduate had been set in 1900, the businessman who nabs Dustin Hoffman at his graduation party would have said: "Young man, I just want to say one word ... one word ... CITRUS!"
Cast your mind back 100 years (an eternity in California time) to an age when there was no film industry, no cult of glamour, and no expanses of barrio, slum, and suburbia. In 1900, the Southern California dream was a Jeffersonian paradise of agrarian nuclear-family bliss. Though technically desert, the vast interior valleys now bloomed with subtropical plants, courtesy of William Mulholland's vast waterworks that drained the eastern Sierra. From these ingredients, dream-makers of 1900 carefully designed a fantasyland that rivaled Disney in its cultural impact.
California Citrus State Historic Park preserves the fantasy intact. When complete at the end of 2001, it will be to the citrus industry what Universal Studios is to the film industry, an activity-packed deep-immersion in the thrill of citrus-farming -- minus, of course, the work. Already, enough of the park is complete that you can get a good feel for 1900's California Dream.
Though this dream is entirely about plants, it eerily prefigures the dreams that would engulf the region a half-century later. The park is not just a citrus orchard. It contains almost all of the signature trees that have come to define Southern California in our imaginations (though not one of them is native there), and all are planted in the roles in which they're most famous:
Washingtonia robusta-- The tall, slender palm -- the signature palm of Los Angeles -- lines most of the trails in the park. You've seen it in the movies, if not in person: a sheer stalk less than 1 foot in diameter soaring to 100 feet, where it bursts into a dollop of greenery. In bleaker moods, it looks like an upended mop. In the best of health, it is still a truly bizarre plant, no matter how familiar it becomes.
Here at the park, freshly planted specimens march alongside you two-by-two like an escort of ethereal giants painted by Dali. Ahead of you, they continue off into the distance in a winding double-line. I had barely started walking when I began to hum: "Follow the yellow brick road". If you've never left Kansas, you don't need more than Washingtonia robusta to tell you that you're in another world.
But there's more.
Eucalyptus spp. -- These trees from another land of Oz, Australia, are all along the stream and planted as windbreaks, as they were throughout California. Grayish-reddish-green, these ghostly trees move and flutter in the slightest breeze, as though whispering to each other or themselves. Any grove of them is powerfully fragrant with that sinus-clearing aroma that was later packaged in cold medicine.
Wisteria sinensis -- No prosperous farm was complete without an arbor of this familar vine with its pendulous purple flowers. The park contains several. These will grow further north, but never bloom with the abundance that they display here.
and finally, of course,
Citrus spp. Oranges, grapefruit, lemons, kumquats, all the major species of this irresistible genus are here in carefully tended orchards. Seemingly heedless of seasons, Citrus often blooms and bears at the same time, a continuous abundance of fragrance and taste. In spring, the time of maximum bloom, the fragrance hangs over the park like a benign, invisible smog. (In summer, the more familiar smog odors still prevail.)
As a northern child, I had eaten countless oranges before I finally met an orange tree at age 18. I still remember the bizarre feeling of picking such a familiar object from such an alien being. I had to peel the orange at once to verify that indeed, there was the familiar geography of sections and navels and seeds, with a brilliant taste sweeter than I had ever found in a produce section. For newcomers, a first encounter with Citrus must have been as bizarre as finding trees that grew diamonds or reams of perfect satin. In short, a tree of fantasy. And since it could be used to make money, it was a fantasy that you could actually live.
It's history now, of course. California no longer produces citrus in any great volume. The water that once grew oranges now grows lawns and washes cars. The land that was so hospitable to this tree is now mostly paved and built upon, creating the vast expanse of continuous sprawl for which the Los Angeles region, above all others, is famous around the world. Where citrus and eucalyptus once moderated the seasons, casting welcome shade in the summer and absorbing the rains of winter, we now have acres of parking lots, which intensify both heat and flood.
Citrus, of course, is not a back-to-nature experience. The plants that define this park are all part of the California Dream, but none is actually native to California. Still, it was an agrarian dream that actually worked, producing magnificent fruit in a landscape of warmth and fragrance. The area of one Wal-Mart parking lot would have produced more oranges, lemons, and grapefruit than a family could eat in a year, while also being an alluring garden where lovers could tryst and men could take a siesta and people could simply stroll for pleasure. Today, people try to do all these things in Wal-Mart parking lots, but somehow, it's just not the same.
Recommended:
Yes
Best time to go: Anytime
Recommended for: Anybody
Review Topic: Overview
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Epinions.com ID:
Urbanist
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Location: San Francisco
Reviews written: 78
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