Orland, Paradise and More – Explore and Learn about Solar!
Our partner in the PG&E Solar Schools Program, The NEED Project, is hosting teacher training workshops in the coming months…at many wonderful locations in California… Check out the locations…Orland, Paradise, San Francisco, Arcata, Fort Bragg…to name a few…
Check dates and locations here:http://www.need.org/pgesolarschools/ssc.htm
Here’s a bit of history on one of our training sites, and a future home of PV on a stick, Orland, CA. Luanne Stewart, a teacher at Fairview Elementary School and resident of Orland, offered this glimpse into Orland’s historic past and future:
When the north valley first learned a railroad was going to be built in their neighborhood, the Chamberlain brothers decided to map out a townsite on some of their land. They had a business district laid out and T.H. Dodson opened up our first hotel and store. Soon a blacksmith also set up shop. It wasn’t long before there was a general store, hardware store, and homes. Everyone was sure hoping that the railroad would build its tracks right through town.
Well, so now they had a town. They had to decide on a name. There were three men who had the honor of choosing a name. They each had a name for Orland, and would not listen to other suggestions. Just short of fisticuffs, the three men decided to put the names into a hat and called a little girl in off the street to pull the name out of the hat. Orland won. Leland and Comstock (both famous historical figures) were the two names not chosen.
The very first post office was housed in a dresser drawer. However, in 1876 Orland did get a post office building. So what about the train???? The train decided it was going to lay its tracks a few miles southeast of Orland in a town that no longer exists. The good folks of Orland got together, bought some land, and offered it to the railroad company saying, “Pleeeeeaaaase, come to Orland,”
So they did. By 1882 trains were running in and out of Orland regularly. The town began to grow rapidly. By 1887 there were 700 people here. One old timer recalls how the skies would blacken with huge flocks of birds. He says it was like a cloud goin’ over. Orland, today, is a thriving metropolis of 6,000 people. It has doubled in population since 1970.
Beautiful Black Butte is 8 miles to the west and offers boating, fishing, camping and equestrian trails up the yingyang. We are a convenient three and a half hours from just about everywhere – the coast, the city, ski resorts, the casinos. We can be anywhere we want to be in half a day, and the beauty of it is, no one wants to come here. (We get mad if we have to park more than 4 cars from the front door of the store.) And for some reason, we allow parking right in the middle of 4th St, our 2 block business district. 1,200 new homes are being built here. They’ve been tearing out orchards and making new roads just to build them. We’ll be needing new schools soon. I think Orland just might be fixin’ to hit another growth spurt.
Fairview Elementary School in Orland will be growing their very own PV on a stick in the coming months as well…we look forward to adding more solar enthusiasts to the Orland growth spurt in the coming months…stay tuned…
April 29th, 2008 at 10:29 am
Have you been able to set up a date for a teacher training in the near future. I will try to get a number of people to sign up.