Introduction
Anaheim, California is the tenth largest city in California and the second largest, after Santa Ana, in Orange County. Anaheim is located about twenty-eight miles southeast of Los Angeles. Founded in 1857 by fifty German families, grape farmers and wine makers from Franconia in Bavaria, the city was incorporated and formally named on February 10, 1870. The name “Anaheim” was created by taking “Ana” from the nearby Santa Ana river and adding the common Upper German suffix “-heim”, meaning “home”. Before that, the town was generally referred to as Campo Aleman, Spanish for “German Camp”. Shortly after the city’s founding, the local grape industry was destroyed by an insect infestation, and the area was gradually industrialized. Despite Anaheim’s reputation for theme parks, sports venues, and the largest convention center on the West Coast, the industrial side of the city’s economy remains, with manufacturing facilities producing electronics, aircraft parts, and canned fruit.
In the 1920s, the Ku Klux Klan decided to make Anaheim a model city for the Klan’s beliefs. In 1924, the organization managed to get four secret members of the KKK elected to the five member governing Board of Trustees. At the time, nine of the ten members of the Anaheim police department were also Klan members. The following year, the newly-elected mens’ affiliation was publicly revealed by political rivals, and they were voted out of office in a recall election in which a record 95% of eligible voters cast ballots.
The Anaheim of the present day is a culturally diverse community in which the majority of the population, by only a small margin, is white, with a rapidly growing Hispanic community. As a popular destination for international tourism and large convention gatherings, Anaheim is prepared to be hospitable to visitors from anywhere in the world.
Celebrities hailing from Anaheim include Carl Karcher, founder of the Carl’s Jr. chain of fast food restaurants, and Gwen Stefani and Tony Kanal, lead singer and bass player, respectively, for the pop group No Doubt.
Fast Facts
- Population inside the city limits: 328,014 according to 2000 census (A July 2004 census bureau estimate placed the population of Anaheim at 333,776 – a 1.8% increase in for years)
- Elevation: 160 feet above sea level
- Area inside city limits: 50.5 square miles (48.9 square miles of land and 1.6 square miles of water)
- Average daily temperature in January: 58.1 degrees Fahrenheit
- Average daily temperature in July: 72.7 degrees Fahrenheit