50 Fun Facts About Los Angeles County

Which Los Angeles County city, home to the ocean liner Queen Mary, is the county's second most populous?

Long Beach is also the largest city in California that is not a county seat. The Queen Mary, an Art Deco liner from 1936, is docked there permanently.

Which resort town in Los Angeles County is the only incorporated city on Santa Catalina Island?

Avalon is also the southernmost city in Los Angeles County. Chewing gum magnate William Wrigley Jr. took control of the island in 1919 and built the town's landmark Catalina Casino.

Which Los Angeles County city hosts the annual Tournament of Roses Parade and the college bowl game that follows it?

Pasadena held its first rose parade in 1890, sponsored by a local social club called the Valley Hunt Club. The city is also home to the science university Caltech.

Which Los Angeles County city, known for Rodeo Drive, is almost entirely surrounded by the city of Los Angeles?

Beverly Hills covers under six square miles. It touches only Los Angeles and one smaller neighbouring city, so it sits like an island inside its giant neighbour.

Which Los Angeles County city, famous for its amusement pier, is the western terminus of historic Route 66?

Santa Monica is bounded by Los Angeles on every side except the west, where it meets the Pacific Ocean. Its pier was built in 1909.

Which Los Angeles County city, headquarters of The Walt Disney Company, is nicknamed the Media Capital of the World?

Burbank takes its name from David Burbank, a dentist who set up a sheep ranch there in 1867. Warner Bros. is headquartered in the city too.

Which Los Angeles County city is home to SoFi Stadium, where the NFL's Rams and Chargers both play?

Inglewood saw SoFi Stadium open in 2020 on the site of a former horse racing track. The city's older arena, the Forum, was home to the Lakers and the Kings for 32 years.

Which neighboring county, now home to Disneyland, was split off from Los Angeles County in 1889?

Orange County separated from Los Angeles County in 1889, with Santa Ana as its seat. San Bernardino and Kern counties had already been carved out of the same parent.

Which Los Angeles County city, nicknamed the Hub City, was made famous by the rap group N.W.A?

Compton got the nickname Hub City for its central position in Los Angeles County. It is one of the county's oldest cities, the eighth to incorporate, back in 1888.

Which Los Angeles County city, home to the Sunset Strip, did not incorporate until 1984?

West Hollywood became a city in 1984, on land that had stayed outside every surrounding city. Hollywood itself was independent only from 1903 until it merged with Los Angeles in 1910.

Which Los Angeles County city, founded to be exclusively industrial, had only 222 residents at the 2020 census?

Vernon is the second least populous city in California, behind only Amador City. Its founders incorporated it in 1905 beside three major railroads, as a home for factories rather than families.

Which city, named from the Spanish for squashes, became Los Angeles County's newest when it incorporated in 1991?

Calabasas incorporated on April 5, 1991. Its name is an old Californio spelling of calabazas, usually linked to the wild squashes that grow in the area.

Which Los Angeles County city, host of the annual county fair, is named after the Roman goddess of fruit?

Pomona got its name in an 1875 contest, from a winning entry submitted by Solomon Gates. By the 1920s the city was known as the Queen of the Citrus Belt.

Which studio town in Los Angeles County was home to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer from 1924 to 1986?

Culver City is named after Harry Culver, who incorporated it in 1917. The old MGM lot is now Sony Pictures Studios.

Which company's second West Coast refinery gave the Los Angeles County city of El Segundo its name?

Standard Oil of California bought the land in 1911, and the name is Spanish for "the second". The refinery entered its second century in 2011 under the company's later name, Chevron.

Which Los Angeles County city is home to the world's oldest operating McDonald's restaurant, opened in 1953?

Downey is also called the birthplace of the Apollo space program, whose systems were developed at a plant in the city. NASA took over the site from the Air Force in 1961.

Which Los Angeles County city, where Richard Nixon grew up and went to college, is named after a Quaker poet?

Whittier honours the poet John Greenleaf Whittier, and its Quaker settlers deeded him a lot in the new town. Nixon later practised law from an office in the city's bank building.

Which Los Angeles County city was the childhood home of Brian, Dennis and Carl Wilson of the Beach Boys?

Hawthorne was named after the novelist Nathaniel Hawthorne, who shared a July 4 birthday with a founder's daughter. A historic landmark marks the site of the Wilson family home.

Which Los Angeles County city became the nation's first contract city in 1954, buying its services from the county?

Lakewood voted in 1954 to incorporate rather than be annexed by a bigger neighbour, then hired the county to run its services. About half the county's cities now buy their policing the same way.

Which unincorporated Los Angeles County community holds a major film studio lot and the theme park beside it?

Universal City is county land with no city government of its own. Its boundaries were adjusted in 2015 so that the entire theme park sits inside the unincorporated area.

Which Los Angeles County city, its fourth most populous, has one of America's largest Armenian communities?

Glendale elected its first Armenian council member, Larry Zarian, in 1983, and he became mayor three years later. By the mid-1990s Armenians and Latinos outnumbered the city's Anglo population.

The Los Angeles County city of Palmdale has been called the American capital of which industry?

Aerospace became Palmdale's main employer after the Air Force set up Plant 42 in the 1950s. The Space Shuttle, the B-2 bomber and the SR-71 Blackbird were all built, tested or serviced there.

Which Los Angeles County city built America's first musical road, which plays part of the William Tell Overture?

Lancaster has the first musical road in the United States, and drivers know its tune as the theme from The Lone Ranger. The city lies in the Antelope Valley, in the western Mojave Desert.

Which Los Angeles County city was formed in 1987 by uniting Valencia, Saugus, Newhall and Canyon Country?

Santa Clarita is the third most populous city in the county. Six Flags Magic Mountain, often assumed to be part of it, actually sits just outside the city limits on unincorporated land.

Which Los Angeles County city renamed its airport Zamperini Field after local track star and war hero Louis Zamperini?

Torrance was founded in October 1912 and named after Jared Sidney Torrance, the developer behind it. Zamperini graduated from the city's high school.

Which Los Angeles County city is home to the soccer stadium where the LA Galaxy play their home games?

Carson only became a city in 1968. The Galaxy's ground is part of Dignity Health Sports Park, a complex that also has a tennis stadium and a track and field facility.

Which Los Angeles County city is home to Santa Anita Park racetrack and to peafowl that roam its neighborhoods?

Arcadia's free-roaming peafowl are a remainder of a 19th-century ranch, whose owner brought the birds from India. On his farm they helped control snakes and snails.

Which Los Angeles County city, incorporated in 1913, is home to the Huntington Library and its botanical gardens?

San Marino takes its name from the tiny European republic, by way of a family plantation in Maryland. The city's seal is modelled on the republic's, three towers and all.

Which small Los Angeles County city, a 1920s oil boomtown, is completely surrounded by a much larger port city?

Signal Hill incorporated in 1924, about three years after a well called Alamitos No. 1 erupted there. The oil field it tapped became one of the most productive in the world.

Which peak in the San Gabriel Mountains, nicknamed Old Baldy, is the highest point in Los Angeles County?

Mount San Antonio rises just over 10,000 feet on the border of Los Angeles and San Bernardino counties. Locals use the nickname so often that many would not recognise the official name.

Which Los Angeles County city of gravel quarries paid the Raiders' owner $10 million for a stadium that was never built?

Irwindale offered Al Davis a disused gravel pit as a stadium site in 1987, with a nonrefundable $10 million signing bonus. Davis kept the money and later took the team back to Oakland.

Which city, ringed by the Los Angeles districts of Sylmar and Pacoima, stayed independent thanks to its own groundwater?

San Fernando voted to incorporate in 1911 by a margin of eight votes. Nearby towns joined Los Angeles to tap its new aqueduct, but the city's own wells let it stay separate.

Which Los Angeles County city incorporated in 1956 under the name Dairy Valley before rebranding as a planned suburb?

Cerritos took its present name in 1967, borrowing it from a nearby rancho. Its rededicated library later became the first building in North America to be coated in titanium panels.

Which Los Angeles County city, home to a consortium of seven colleges, is nicknamed the City of Trees and PhDs?

Claremont's early history was tied to a college that moved into an unfinished hotel there. It is one of the few places left in North America whose American elms were never exposed to Dutch elm disease.

Which small Los Angeles County city made national news in 2010 when its officials were caught drawing enormous salaries?

Bell's pay scandal surfaced when two Los Angeles Times reporters, looking into a neighbouring city, filed public records requests. Eight officials were arrested, and all but one were convicted.

Which Los Angeles County city takes its name from a Washington Irving book about a Moorish palace in Spain?

Alhambra got its name because the founder's daughter, Ruth, was reading Irving's tales of the Granada palace. She persuaded her father to use it for his new development.

Which Los Angeles County city is where the very first In-N-Out Burger stand opened in 1948?

Baldwin Park's original In-N-Out was the first drive-thru hamburger stand in California. It was demolished to make way for a freeway, and a replica now stands near the site.

Which Los Angeles County city is the hometown of the time-travelling slackers in Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure?

San Dimas is where the film's two heroes are high school students when their adventure begins. The city's name is Spanish for Saint Dismas.

Which Los Angeles County city is the home of the Zamboni Company, maker of ice resurfacing machines?

Paramount took its name from its main north-south boulevard when two post offices merged in 1948. The Zamboni family built the Iceland skating rink there in 1939, and Frank Zamboni invented his machine to resurface its ice.

Which Los Angeles County city, its smallest by area, takes its name from a 1920s refreshment stand?

Hawaiian Gardens grew up around a stand decorated with palm fronds and bamboo, the rural area's main landmark for years. The city covers only about one square mile.

Which gated city on the Palos Verdes Peninsula has no traffic lights and requires room for horses on every lot?

Rolling Hills, incorporated in 1957, has private roads and three entry gates. Its only commercially zoned land holds the city hall, a community association and a fire station.

Which Los Angeles County city, once nicknamed Little Taipei, is where the sealed potato chip bag was invented?

Monterey Park is where Laura Scudder invented the first sealed bag of potato chips in 1926. The Little Taipei label came in the 1980s, after a local realtor sold land to newly arrived immigrants.

Which densely populated Los Angeles County city is named after the meat-packing baron who bought its land in 1908?

Cudahy's founder, Michael Cudahy, bought some 2,800 acres of an old rancho to resell as one-acre lots. Buyers were meant to keep a vegetable garden, fruit trees and a chicken coop or stable.

Which Los Angeles County city's name is usually traced to a Tongva place name meaning skunk place?

Azusa appears to come from Asuksa-nga, where asuksa means skunk and -nga marks a place. Local boosters have long promoted a backronym claiming that the name spans the whole alphabet.

Which Los Angeles County city has historically billed itself as the end of the Santa Fe Trail?

El Monte sat on the Old Spanish Trail, the trade route that linked New Mexico with Southern California. Its name is old Spanish for the wood, after the thick willows that grew there, not for a mountain.

Which unincorporated Los Angeles County community is built around North America's largest man-made small-craft harbor?

Marina del Rey has slips for about 5,000 boats on what used to be a salt marsh fed by Ballona Creek. Like every unincorporated area, it is run directly by the county.

Which Navy-owned island, the southernmost of California's Channel Islands, is part of Los Angeles County?

San Clemente Island is owned and operated by the United States Navy. The county sheriff's deputies who serve it are based on the neighbouring island of Santa Catalina.

Which elected body, nicknamed the five little kings, governs Los Angeles County and its unincorporated areas?

The Board of Supervisors was created by the state legislature in 1852, when the county had only a few thousand people. Each supervisor is elected from a district for a four-year term.

Which seaside resort, founded by Abbot Kinney in 1905, was an independent city until Los Angeles annexed it in 1926?

Venice opened on July 4, 1905, with miles of canals that its founder dug to drain the marshes. After annexation, Los Angeles showed little interest in maintaining the unusual neighborhood.

Which Los Angeles County rock formation, named for a bandit who hid there, doubled as alien planets in Star Trek?

Vasquez Rocks takes its name from Tiburcio Vásquez, a bandit who used the formation to elude capture in 1874. Star Trek fans know its most famous outcrop as Kirk's Rock.