A History Lesson
(The parentheses are me.)


Of Days Gone By
Posted on: Monday, 20 February
By Bruce Chambers, The Orange County Register, Calif.

Feb. 19--In 1968, my best buddy David McIntier moved from our suburban Anaheim neighborhood to the more rural town of Placentia. I visited often, and juvenile delinquents that we were, we took to "exploring" the orange groves that surrounded his newly built neighborhood.

The common wisdom among us was that the groves were owned by "mean old farmers, who are bound to take after you and blast you with rock salt from their shotguns."
So it was with some trepidation that we passed through the thick groves of the George Key Ranch (the site of my parent's wedding in 1973) and into a well-manicured garden. Quietly, an elderly man approached us to introduce himself. McIntier bolted for home and left me for dead.

I don't remember much of that brief conversation, but I do remember that George G. Key (my great-grandfather) was kind to me and proud to give me a tour of his private garden. He invited me to visit anytime. Unfortunately I did not take him up on his offer until a few weeks ago, long after his death in 1989. I am thankful that Key left enough behind so that I could learn all about the life that he lived to the fullest.

George Key was born in 1896, on a Fullerton ranch where his father supervised the first Valencia orange grove in Orange County, CA. He witnessed the birth of Placentia and as a young man could easily name all the families that lived in town (including the Charles Chapman family of Chapman University, for whom his future father-in-law served as night watchman to the family orange groves ). He married the local storekeeper's daughter (whom he loved from grade school, leaving flowers on her desk everyday) and attended the Placentia Presbyterian church that his father helped found.

Today the George Key Ranch is a county park, site of a 1-acre orange grove (where I used to hunt for easter eggs and fairies). The grove is the last in Placentia and the Ranch is Placentia's oldest home. It's a wonderful display of days gone by.

(I only have one clear memory of my great grandfather. Every time we would go to visit him, he would be in his office, which was furnished with beautiful dark oak furniture. It was an incredibly old-fashioned room, except for this enormous, pink foot-shaped shag carpet my grandfather always had draped over the back of his chair. I guess it made 3-year old me feel comfortable enough to run up to him and jump in his lap, for which I was always rewarded with a kiss and a chuckle. Isn't it amazing how such quiet men can lead such dynamic lives?)