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California.
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Federated state of the southwestern USA, 411,049 km², 36,457,549
residents (2006 estimate), 89 residents/km²,
capital: Sacramento. Borders: Oregon (N), Nevada (E), Arizona (SE), Mexico (Baja
California Norte) (S); Pacific ocean (W). "For the physical-political map
see vol. V, page 213" "For the geographical map see the lemma of the 4th
volume."
Morphology, climate, hydrography
California is the third largest state after Alaska and Texas and the first by
population. Morphologically is constituted by two mountain ranges, the Coast
Range (Coast Range) and the Sierra Nevada, arranged parallel to the coast and
separated from Great Valley. The Coastal Range (Mount Thompson, 2744 m) follows
the coast from NW to SE and is interrupted by a long transversal fault (a cause
of considerable seismicity) at the San Francisco bay, where
the Sacramento and San Joaquin. Inland, on the border with Nevada, the Sierra
Nevada rises, more rugged and imposing, reaching 4418 m in Mount Whitney; the
two chains meet N in the volcanic group of Mount Shasta (4317 m) and Lassen peak
(3187 m). AS a vast, arid and desert plateau (deserts of Mojave and Colorado),
descends towards the Colorado River (which forms the border with Arizona),
interrupted by the depressions of the Death Valley (Death Valley, –86 m), the
lowest and warmest area of the North American subcontinent, and of Lake Salton
(–70 m); some hills, irregularly arranged (mount San Gorgonio, 3501 m; mount San
Jacinto, 3301 m; mount San Antonio, 3075 m) rise close to the narrow southern
coastal plain. The coast, which extends for more than 1350 km, is uniform and
important, except for the central section, where the bays of San Francisco and
Monterey open. The southern coastal stretch is faced by the archipelago of the
Santa Barbara islands, wonderful for their landscapes and active fishing
bases. California's climate is predominantly Mediterranean, but morphological
differences significantly affect rainfall. Precipitation is abundant on the
western slopes of the mountain ranges and increases towards the north; the S,
precluded to marine influences from coastal reliefs, is hot and dry (in the
Death Valley 56 ºC were recorded in the shade). The hydrographic network hinges
on the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers to the north and Colorado to the
S; other rivers of some importance are the Klamath, the Trinity, the Eel and the
Russian.
Demography
The population is concentrated in the large metropolitan areas of Sacramento,
San Francisco-Oakland, Los Angeles-Long Beach, San Bernardino-Riverside,
Oxnard-Ventura-Thousand Oaks, Fresno, San José, San Diego and Anaheim-Santa
Ana. California's demographic evolution has very particular aspects, starting
with the formidable growth rate: from 1,485,000 inhabitants. in 1900 the
population rose to 6,875,000 residents in 1940, equal to 5.2% of the entire
USA; this incidence had doubled in 1980 (10.5%, with 23,668,000 inhabitants) and
the increase continued also following an annual rate of 2%, absolutely
exceptional for the federal context. After the now historical migration flows,
in the second post-war period California had become a destination for the
professional and white-collar classes coming from the Eastern States, as a
consequence of the at least partial shift to W of the US economic center of
gravity. But in the most recent period immigration has returned to mainly
external origins, Mexican and Asian (Korea, Japan, Philippines, Viet Nam), with
the addition of significant student flows from all over the USA; for the first
time, moreover, population growth was equally intense both in the northern
section (San Francisco, Sacramento) and in the south, while in the past it had
always been concentrated in the latter (Los Angeles). Within the state, then,
the mobility of the population does not reflect production locations as much as
the distribution of social services, despite the undoubted influence of peculiar
phenomena such as the high-tech industrialization of Silicon Valley (San José,
Santa Clara), starting from the seventies of the twentieth century.
Economy
Favored by the climate and a large irrigation system, California is one of
the richest agricultural regions in the world and the largest agricultural
producer in the United States, especially for fruit and vegetables (citrus
fruits, apples, pears, peaches, plums, grapes and tomatoes), sugar beets,
cotton, rice and barley. Breeding is widely practiced (poultry, cattle and pig),
which feeds a thriving processing industry; fishing is active (salmon, tuna,
crustaceans). Forestry is of great importance (the famous sequoias grow
theregiants) for the production of timber (in third place after Oregon and
Washington State), paper, pulp and furniture. Mineral resources, more than gold,
include oil and natural gas today; important are also the deposits of mercury,
tungsten, lead, chromite, zinc, copper and iron. The industrialization of
California was recent but very rapid, facilitated by a dense road and rail
network and an air service that makes use of 280 public airports and approx. 750
private individuals; the most advanced are the food, paper and film sectors
(in Hollywood), petrochemical, chemical, metallurgical, mechanical (aircraft,
machinery, electrical machines), in addition to the electronic one, for which
California covers a position of absolute worldwide importance. War orders are
also vital for the state economy; most of the US armament is produced in
California. Finally, the numerous national parks (Lassen, Yosemite, Sequoia,
Pinnacles, etc.), the seaside and winter sports resorts and the ruins of the
Spanish missions (18th century) make California one of the most popular tourist
destinations in the United States. In California there are three of the world's
largest astronomical observatories, those of Mount Palomar, of Mount Hamilton
and of Mount Wilson.
History
California was partially explored by the Spanish in the century. XVI but the
first European settlements date back to the century. XVIII, after the discovery
of the bay of San Francisco and the foundation of the first Franciscan
mission. Spanish colony, it then passed to Mexico, which however was unable to
exercise its sovereignty more than formally, so much so that it tried in vain to
sell it to Great Britain. When the first American settlers arrived, a few
thousand Spaniards concentrated along the coast lived in the country, public
services were lacking, the roads and communications with Mexico City were
difficult and dangerous. In 1845 the USA began negotiations for the purchase of
California and New Mexico, but the negotiations failed and only at the end of
the war with Mexico did the USA, with the Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo (February
2, 1848), they obtained, after having occupied it, California upon payment of 15
million dollars. With the discovery (1849) of gold deposits in the Sacramento
valley, the region changed rapidly; following the famous gold rush that occurred
in those years, the population increased dramatically (San Francisco alone went
from 6000 to 85,000 inhabitants), with consequent growth of cities and economic
activities. California was given a Constitution in 1849 and was admitted to the
Union in 1850, to which it remained loyal during the Secession War., as a free
(non-slave) state. However, it was the scene of serious racial tensions later,
between the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. The cause of the crisis
was the strong Asian immigration (especially Chinese and Japanese). In 1879 a
state law excluded the Chinese from civil rights. Subsequently, the Japanese
were hit, against which discriminatory laws were enacted such as the blocking of
immigration and the ban on buying land (1906-07), which contributed to the
deterioration of Japanese-American relations. The situation was normalized only
in 1924. After 1960 in California, which became the most populous state of the
Union, conservative and reactionary political positions developed and in
contrast, and, on the contrary, extremist movements of youth protest.
Art: California Indians
The California Indians did not produce particular works of art: the northern
populations were influenced by the Northwest Indians and some tribes were
particularly skilled in the plot and plumary art, while the southern populations
suffered from the influence of culture farming of neighboring Pueblos and
Northern Mexicans. The settlement in the Californian region of the Franciscan
missionaries led to the emergence of that kind of architecture called mission
style, which differs from other colonial styles in that it is linked to the
Spanish Renaissance and Baroque principles. After California moved to the United
States, a Californian style was born in which the Spanish elements are joined by
neoclassical components derived from New England. Characteristics of this style
had wide diffusion starting from 1900 by various architects.
Sacramento (city)
City (404,168 residents in 1998; 1,656,000 residents the metropolitan area
in 1997), and capital of the State of California (USA), located 120 km NE of San
Francisco, on the lower course of the homonymous river, at the confluence in it
of the American River. Important communications hub at the intersection of
numerous traffic routes, including the "Central Pacific" railway line, it is
also an active port center thanks to the presence of a canal that connects the
city with Rio Vista, at the mouth of the Sacramento. The economy of Sacramento
is based not only on rail and river traffic, but also on the trade of
agricultural, forestry and livestock products of northern California and on
industry, active in the food sectors (sugar factories, mills, dairies, pileries,
canneries), engineering (railway material), graphics and wood. Lastly,
Sacramento is a remarkable cultural center, home to Sacramento State College
(1947), various libraries and museums. Airport.
San Francisco (California)
City (837,442 residents, in 2013; 4,516,276 residents, the metropolitan area
in 2013) of the western United States (California).
State Overview
The largest financial and commercial center of the US Pacific coast, it is
located on the hilly San Mateo Peninsula, washed by San Francisco Bay to the E,
the Golden Gate to the N and the Pacific Ocean to the W. The metropolitan area
occupies a large part of the region which overlooks San Francisco Bay and
includes some large centers, including Oakland, Berkeley, San Leandro, San
Mateo and Palo Alto connected by three large bridges, the Golden Gate Bridge,
the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge and the San Mateo Bridge. The historic
center of the city, crossed by typical trams and dotted with skyscrapers and
buildings with the most varied architectural styles (Maimonides Health Center,
by E. Mendelsohn, 1946-50; Transamerica Pyramid, by William L. Pereira,
1969-72; Millennium Tower, by Gary Edward Handel, 2005-2009), occupies the NE
end of the peninsula and faces the oldest section of the port, behind which the
Barbary Coast and Chinatown neighborhoods extend, in turn dominated by Nob
Hill. It is home to the University of San Francisco (1855), the University of
California (1868), a library (San Francisco Public Library) in which over one
million volumes are kept, and numerous colleges and research
institutions. Stanford University (1891) is located in Palo Alto.
Urban
San Francisco looks like a large modern metropolis, full of scenic spots and
picturesque aspects. Very little remains of the oldest settlement and of the
nineteenth-century city after the disastrous earthquake of 1906 (church of S.
Francesco, 1792-1810; Ferry Building, 1890-1900, with a tower inspired by the
Giralda of Seville). In the period before the Second World War, the increased
importance of the port and industrial and demographic development (San Francisco
had 635,000 inhabitants already in 1940) determined the city 's enormous growth,
up to the urbanization of the whole peninsula and the creation of a metropolitan
area with more than 5 million inhabitants. Urban development made it necessary
to open large connecting arteries, such as bridges that cross the bay (San
Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge, 1936; Golden Gate Bridge, 1937), while the problem
of communication between the various suburbs that arose on the hills has
recently been solved by creating underwater tunnels, underground and elevated
arteries. The port area became an object, starting from the sixties of the
century. XX, of a functional and urban restructuring program: the ancient
fishing port (Fisherman's Wharf) has become a commercial and tourist
area, also through the conversion of the first industrial buildings into
accommodation complexes. Particular attention was then paid to the organization
of passenger terminals and their connection with the new urban transport network
(BARTD, Bay Area Rapid Transit District). While maintaining large
spaces available for the transport of goods (gradually specialized in the
movement of containers), the demolition of some docks was planned, with
the destination of the areas thus obtained for public services and residences
for the middle classes. In fact, it should be stressed that San Francisco is one
of the most dynamic cities in the United States, not yet reached by the
deglomerative phenomena that characterize the metropolises of the eastern
part. Note the plans for the Mission Bay and Ferry Building areas drawn up by IM
Pei (in collaboration) in the early 1980s. XX. It is a multipurpose recovery
used as a residence, tertiary and green.
History
Located in a highly coveted strategic position, San Francisco was the site of
a Spanish garrison and mission (1776 and 1777). In 1806 the Russians made an
attempt, rejected, to establish a settlement there. The war broke out between
Mexico, which had taken over Spain, and the USA, in 1846 they occupied the
locality, which from the following year was renamed with the current name, which
was to replace the original name of Yerba Buena. The discovery of gold
produced (starting from 1849) a turbulent development of what had hitherto been
a small village. San Francisco was devastated by five fires between 1849 and
1851 and in 1906 was destroyed by a tremendous earthquake. The seismic risk,
albeit with minor manifestations, reoccurred between the late eighties and the
early nineties of the century. XX.
Museums
Important cultural center, San Francisco houses important museums, including
the MH De Young Memorial Museum (with European works of the eighteenth century),
the Museum of Modern Art (dedicated to contemporary art), the Asian Art Museum
and the Fire Arts Museum, academies and art galleries.
Show
The theatrical activity in San Francisco began around 1850 and immediately
manifested itself with a proliferation of initiatives: numerous theaters arose
(one of which, the Jenny Line, which was an integral part of a hotel-gambling
den-saloon, was twice rebuilt in a year after many fires) and national and
foreign vedettes, opera, ballets and shows of all kinds were
hosted. There was also an independent activity and personalities such
as Belasco, Maude Adams and James O'Neill had the opportunity to start their
career here. Then, with the sec. XX, San Francisco became, like almost all
American cities, a mere "square" for the exploitation of Broadway hits, while
the musical life was more intense with the foundation of a stable orchestra of
great prestige and, in 1922, of an opera theater which regularly hosted the most
illustrious names of world opera. Only after the middle of the century the city
regained importance in the panorama of the American scene, thanks to the Actor's
Workshop, a stable company founded in 1956 by J. Blau and J. Irving and remained
active for a decade, and especially at San Francisco Mime Troupe, created by R.
Davies in 1962 and considered one of the most relevant formations of the
American stage avant-garde.
Economy
The most important industries are active in the petrochemical, shipbuilding
and canning sectors; the food, publishing, metalworking, electrical engineering,
chemical, textile, paper, rubber, wood, brick and clothing sectors are also of
considerable development. The city has a port, which is among the most active in
the country and the first in terms of traffic volume with Asia and Oceania:
served by over 100 km of internal railways, it is the port of call for about
fifty shipping lines. for abroad and many others for the interior and the
centers of the bay. It is also served by the San Francisco International
Airport.
Below you will see top cities in California. Visit
allcitypopulation to find more major cities and towns in California listed by population.
Los Angeles (United States)
City (3,849,378 residents, 2006; 12,876,000 residents, 2007, the urban
agglomeration) of the western United States (California).
Located on the coast of the Pacific ocean, in a short plain closed to the
north and east by the mountains, which shelter it from the northern and blowing
winds from within the country. It occupies an area of 1204 km², so much so
that it is considered the largest city in the USA, although it is not the most
populous: it extends over 80 km from N to S (San Fernando Valley-Los Angeles
Harbor) and for 50 km from the San Gabriel Mountains (E) to the sea and includes
numerous inhabited areas (Santa Monica, Beverly Hills, Culver
City, Hollywood, Inglewood, Long Beach, Pasadena, etc.), separated by vast
undeveloped spaces and connected to each other by numerous communication routes
and very fast services. It had a rapid economic and urban development with the
arrival of the railways, the Southern Pacific (1876) and the Santa Fe Railroad
(1885) and even more with the discovery (1892) and the exploitation, in the
surrounding area, of oil fields and with the construction of the artificial port
(1899) on the bay of San Pedro. Los Angeles is also an important cultural
center, home to numerous institutions and high schools, including the University
of Southern California (1880), Loyola Marymount University (1911), the
University of California (1868), Pepperdine University (1937), the California
Institute of Technology (1891), Occidental College (1887), Pomona College (1887)
and Whittier College (1887).
Urban
The disordered building expansion, which took place without rational
planning, and the distribution of the population in a series of urban
agglomerations separated by vast undeveloped spaces, spread over a vast surface
and connected only by large highways, make practically equivalent every part of
the area of Los Angeles, causing the lack of a real center, which is replaced by
the co-presence of shopping centers in pedestrianized areas (Olvera
Street; Farmers' Market; Riverside Mall, 1966; Burbank Mall, 1968). The failure
to create a planning body for the whole city and the ineffectiveness of existing
ones represent the complementary aspect of the self-planning of the individual
communities. On the one hand, in fact, the high and middle income communities
move away from the degraded central areas to move to separate centers (Rolling
Hills, Westlake, Leisure World etc.); on the other, the progressive
ghettoization of the central areas (the African American ghetto of Watts, the barriosChicani
from East Los Angeles and Pico Union, the depressed area of Venice etc.) has
led to the request by these minorities of complete political, administrative and
planning autonomy in their territory. In recent decades, industrialization and
the increase in tertiary activities have attracted manpower in particular,
triggering a consistent population growth. However, there are numerous problems
related to this expansion of the city and first of all that of water supply,
which was done by building large artificial lakes in the Sierra Nevada (also 400
km away from Los Angeles) and powerful barriers on the Colorado River, which
they supply the city with water and energy.
History
Founded by Spanish Franciscans in 1781 under the name of Nuestra Señora de
Los Angeles, from 1845 to 1857 it was the capital of California. During the war
between the United States and Mexico it was occupied by the North Americans
(1856) and, after the war (1848), it passed to the USA together with its
region. It became an important railway junction in the second half of the
century. XIX, it grew rapidly after the discovery of important oil fields and
the development of the agricultural and film industries.
Museums
The Los Angeles County Museum of Art, founded in 1911, is housed in an
extraordinary collection of buildings - the main entrance overlooking Wilshire
Boulevard - which have been built over the years to house the various
collections (the art pavilion Japanese has been open since 1988). The museum
includes archaeological collections (Egyptian and classical antiquities) and
important sections dedicated to oriental art (Islamic, Far Eastern, Indian
etc.). Particularly noteworthy are the collections of applied art (glasses,
enamels, tapestries, furniture, fabrics, costumes), among which the Gilbert
collection of minute mosaics of various Italian manufactures should be
mentioned. Very rich are the sections of European sculpture from the Middle Ages
to the Renaissance, of European painting from the sec. XV to the
century, Reni, Van Dyck, G. de La Tour, Chardin, Degas), of American painting of
the sec. XVIII and sec. XIX (Copley, West, Homer, Cassatt, Sargent). The museum
also houses a photographic section and one of prints and drawings. Finally, the
art collection of the sec. XX (Picasso, Braque, Kandinskij and contemporary
American painters). Furthermore, the fundamental collections collected in the
MoCA - Museum of Contemporary Art (inaugurated in 1986), the Hammer museum,
inaugurated in 1990, and the Paul Getty Museum in Malibu (near Santa Monica),
opened to the public for the first time in 1953.
Economy
The main economic resources of Los Angeles are, in addition to the film
industry (Hollywood) and the extraction and refining of oil, the metalworking
industries (motor vehicles, aircraft), food, textiles, chemicals,
electrotechnics, electronics, shipbuilding, graphic-editorial, pharmaceutical,
rubber, glass and furniture industries. Tertiary activities and, in particular,
administrative and financial functions, as well as trade, favored by the port
and Los Angeles International Airport, are also of great importance. Also
important is tourism favored by the mild climate and the beauty of the
landscape.
Curiosity
The Hollywood Boulevard combines the symbols and the most famous places of
cinema: the Mann's Chinese Theater before and the Kodak Theater then (since
2002) host every year, in late February, the ceremony of the Oscars (Academy
Awards); in the courtyard of the Chinese Theater are the footprints of the great
movie stars impressed on the concrete. On the same street is also the Hollywood
Walk of Fame, the walk on which paved pink stars stand out where the names of
the most famous characters of the show are set. In the Beverly Hills
neighborhood instead live famous actors and producers of cinema and
television. On the outskirts of Los Angeles stands Disneyland, created by Walt
Disney in 1955.
Silicon Valley
Flat strip of land, 50 km long, south of San Francisco (California),
between Palo Alto and San José (Santa Clara county), where it was built,
starting from the thirties of the century. XX, the first "technopolis" in the
world, still used as a model for this advanced location typology. The first
settlements were those of the Varian Associated (1937) and Hewlett-Packard
(1938), which directed the specialization of the area towards calculating
machines and related component parts. A fundamental success factor was the close
integration between scientific research (Stanford University of Palo Alto) and
industry, supported by public funding and by the availability of both
qualitatively trained and quantitatively abundant labor. The proliferation of
businesses, with an increasing commitment to risk
capital, microprocessors, computers, video games, digital clocks, etc.), for 25%
to other advanced industrial branches (chemical-pharmaceutical, biotechnological
and aeronautical) and for the remainder to the tertiary sector, basic and
innovative. Among the most well-known social reasons we still
remember Apple, Intel, Motorola, National Semiconductor, Advanced Micro Devices,
Cetus and Genentech. The availability of local administrations, which have
favored the preparation of equipped areas and infrastructures, has also helped
to root these activities in the socio-cultural structure of the population,
beneficiaries of the highest per capita income in the whole world. The
diversification of production and services has finally allowed Silicon Valley to
face the crisis of the early nineties by suffering less repercussions than other
monospecialized areas in the electronics industry. The relaunch of the
electronics and IT industry, following the so-called New Economy and thanks the
commercial possibilities of the Internet and the World Wide Web, had paradoxical
effects on Silicon Valley. In fact, it highlighted a shortage of specialized
personnel, caused both by the increase in demand and by the decreased frequency
of American students in scientific faculties. This deficiency has been made up
for by promoting the temporary immigration of tens of thousands of engineers and
computer scientists, in particular from Asian countries.
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