Material in the public domain. No restrictions on use.
Description
Key Words: Citrus Groves, Packing Houses [Part 1] Roy Soper moved to California in 1944. He lived in Claremont with his wife, Edna Mae, and owned citrus groves in Bloomington, Fontana, and Claremont. Soper describes the process of purchasing, clearing, and planting a citrus grove. Irrigation was always challenging for citrus owners; Soper describes how he needed shares from water companies in order to put in pipelines that brought water to the grove and how he needed to install sprinkler systems that watered the citrus trees. Besides purchasing the grove and owning water shares, the biggest expenses for citrus owners were fertilization, pruning, smudging, and picking. Soper remembers the coldest years which really damaged the citrus industry: 1913, 1922, 1937, 1949, 1950, 1968, 1978, and 1990. He describes the relationship between the citrus growers, the packing houses, and the citrus association. There were several factors that influenced the decline of the citrus industry in the Claremont area: “The trees got older, more disease developed . . . [the trees were] too close together, they shaded one another out, got too tall and one thing led to another. . . At about the same time the expansion of population took place and that made for mergers of packing houses. . . They closed the packing house here and moved what fruit was left.” The growers sold their groves to developers, who used the land to build houses. [Part 2] Soper describes the labor camps and the racial diversity among the pickers and packing house workers. Before World War II, most of the workers in the packing house were white, but after World War II most of the packing house workers were Mexican Americans.
Type
sound
Format
Master Audio cassette
Form/Genre
Oral histories
Extent
1 Tape of 1
Identifier
caclah_000036
Language
English
Subject
Citrus fruit industry--California Citrus fruit industry--California--History Citrus fruits--California Fruit Packing Local history Real estate development--California
Time Period
1944/
Place
Claremont (Calif.)
Provenance
Claremont Heritage California Revealed is supported by the U.S. Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act, administered in California by the State Librarian.
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