Hometown History - Visiting Los Angeles
Friday, June 27 2008 | Comments (0)
Grant with R2D2.
Grant is the quiet, shy guy who gets motion sickness. He's also the electronics guru and radio control specialist of the group and with good reason; he has a ton of experience and a degree in electrical engineering from the University of Southern California.
Having grown up in Los Angeles, it's not hard to see how the enthusiastic young scientist found his calling in theatrical engineering. Besides making a championship battle bot, he also worked for George Lucas' Industrial Light & Magic where he operated R2-D2 (one of only a handful of official operators), Grant also developed a custom circuit for the Energizer Bunny so that its arm and ears beat at a constant rate.
It was only a few years ago that the energetic engineer was running the streets of Los Angeles, the second largest city in the U.S. with a population of around 3.8 million. L.A., as it's called, covers 469.1 square miles in Southern California. It is the seat of Los Angeles County, the most populous and one of the most diverse counties in the country.
The L.A. skyline.
The city was founded in 1781 by the Spanish governor Felipe de Neve. He named it El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Ángeles de Porciúncula (The Village of Our Lady, the Queen of the Angels of Porziuncola).
It became a part of Mexico in 1821, following its independence from Spain. In 1848, at the end of the Mexican-American War, Los Angeles and California were purchased as part of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, becoming part of the U.S. Mexico retained the territory of Baja until.
The first Europeans arrived in 1542 led by João Cabrilho, a Portuguese explorer. He continued with his voyage, however, and did not establish a settlement. The next arrival would not come for 227 years. Gaspar de Portola, along with Franciscan missionary Juan Crespí, reached Los Angeles on August 2, 1769.
In 1777 Felipe de Neve, recommended to the viceroy of New Spain that the site noted by Juan Crespi be developed into a pueblo. The town was founded on September 4, 1781, by a group of 44 settlers. Today, the pueblo is commemorated in the historic district Olvera Street, the oldest part of the city.
New Spain achieved its independence from the Spanish Empire in 1821, and the pueblo continued as a part of Mexico. Mexican rule ended during the Mexican-American War, after the signing of the Treaty of Cahuenga.
Railroads arrived in 1876, Oil was discovered in 1892, and by 1923 Los Angeles was producing one-quarter of the world's petroleum.
By 1900, the population had grown to more than 102,000 people, which was too demanding of the water supply, so they began building an aqueduct, that was completed in 1913. In 1915, Los Angeles began the annexation of dozens of neighboring communities without water supplies of their own.
In the 1920s, the motion picture and aviation industries flocked to Los Angeles. World War II and the expansion of defense industries brought new growth and prosperity to the city.
The post-war years saw an even greater boom, as urban sprawl expanded the city into the San Fernando Valley. In 1969, Los Angeles became one of the birthplaces of the Internet, as the first ARPANET transmission was sent from UCLA to SRI in Menlo Park.
The wide variety of race and cultural differences led to strife as well. Los Angeles grappled with the Watts Riots in 1965, the high school walkout by Chicano students in 1968, and the 1970 Chicano Moratorium.
Downtown Los Angeles saw heavy development from the 1980's to 1990's, including the construction of some of the city's tallest skyscrapers. The remainder of the 1980s found the city plagued by increasing gang violence and police corruption. Racial tensions erupted again in 1992 with the Rodney King controversy and the large-scale riots that followed the acquittal of his police attackers.
The city is also known for earthqueakes. In 1994, the 6.7 Northridge earthquake shook the city, causing $12.5 billion in damage and 72 deaths.
Of course, one of the more notable attractions is of the city is Hollywood - the homebase of popular culture. It's still a part of the city since voters defeated efforts by the San Fernando Valley and Hollywood to secede from the city in 2002.
Which brings the story back to Grant and his lifetime of California living. He may not finish out his life there, but he doesn't seem to be going anywhere soon and Los Angeles can only be better for that.
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