Southern California’s Irvine Ranch of the late 1800s was real and equally as grand as the Ponderosa. The Irvine Ranch stretched from the Pacific Ocean to the coastal range and contained some of Southern California’s most impressive acreage. Images of James Irvine, riding for the better part of a day across the expansive ranch, tells volumes about the importance of Irvine land to the growth of Orange County. This empire, more than any other factor, shaped the county’s destiny.

The progression of the Irvine Ranch reads like a great American novel. There was tremendous risk yielding extravagant wealth, fierce competition, a mysterious death, deception, lawsuits and many battles for the immense political power that was concentrated in the ranch.

James Irvine and partners purchased the ranch at an average of 25 cents an acre in the 1860s. It consisted of approximately 100,000 acres that were previously part of Rancho San Joaquin, Rancho Lomas de Santiago and Rancho de Santa Ana. The entire ranch was valued at $748,500 at the time of James’ death in 1886. (Today, lot value alone in the Harbor View Homes is approximately $750,000.)

The ranch hopscotched over its land selling, developing, donating, and protecting parcels in an effort to create a longstanding profit center. In doing so, it created the main infrastructure that exists in present day Orange County. Irvine land was responsible for El Toro Marine Corps Air Station, now the center of the great airport debate; the U.S. Navy Lighter Than Air Station, soon to be a self-sufficient community; the University of California at Irvine, one of California’s premier educational institutions; Crystal Cove State Park, a beautiful and controversial stretch of beach and homes; the original Pacific Coast Highway; the not-so-old toll roads with their clustered growths, and the John Wayne Airport environs.

The roster of residential home developments created on ranch land is unparalleled anywhere in the world. In 1903 George E. Hart bought 700 “non-productive acres” to develop the village of Corona Del Mar for $150 an acre. This was one of many such developments on Irvine land. Over the years, the ranch became the main catalyst for residential growth in many areas of Orange County.

Irvine land was important in the development of Anaheim Colony, Tustin City, Santa Ana, Newport Beach, and the master-planned city of Irvine. Company planners used the ocean and mountains as dramatic backdrops while conceiving hundreds of communities and neighborhoods on all parts of the ranch.

Leaders of the Irvine Ranch/Company included three Irvines (James, J.I., and Myford), Arthur McFadden, Charles Thomas, William Mason, Raymond Watson, Peter Kremer, Thomas Nielson, and Donald Bren. Over the years, the ranch moved away from being an agricultural center and moved closer to being a development company. Every step by the company was calculated. During tight fiscal times and boom years, company policy was sculpted accordingly.

For instance, Peter Kremer’s presidency started in 1977 with the revolt of the Committee of 4,000. Many area homeowners lived on land leased to them by the ranch. The lease terms stated that payments of 5% to 6% of the land value should be used. The Committee of 4,000 challenged the new board of directors, which included A. Alfred Taubman, Herbert Allen, Don Bren, and Joan Irvine Smith, indicating that these terms were unrealistic for the homeowners. Because of its recent purchase by the Taubman-Allen-Irvine consortium for $334.7 million, the $100 million debt put a hardship on the company, so it began to sell the land to the homeowners.

Simultaneously, a plot was hatched to purchase the company from the consortium. The lead character was board member Donald Bren. Clandestine efforts resulted in the 1983 leveraged buyout that landed Bren 68,000 acres of agriculture and commercial land. He gained millions of square feet of office buildings, retail centers, industrial buildings, and apartments; as well as marinas, a cable television system and a local newspaper.

Since 1983 there have been two very aggressive upswings in real estate values and a business and population boom throughout Southern California elevating him to the Forbes Magazine list of the nation’s wealthiest. Under Bren’s leadership, The Irvine Company has redesigned the look of the ranch. Aliso Viejo, Newport Coast, Tustin Ranch, Bonita Canyon, Quail Hill, Shady Canyon, and North Irvine have been created.

You may curse the bumper-to-bumper traffic, resent the yellowed skies or tire of the hurried lifestyle, but lean back and relax. You live in one of the world’s most logical and beautiful places. Because of a century of building on ranch lands, accentuating efficiently designed homes, nestled in specially orchestrated neighborhoods set upon serene pastures and lonely hillsides, a vibrant and exciting lifestyle has been created for you and your family. Count your blessings, because all this comes with the warm and gentle sun of Southern California, a sort of Ponderosa with prestige.