Canyon Country, Santa Clarita, California
Encyclopedia
Santa Clarita, California
Santa Clarita is the fourth largest city in Los Angeles County, California, United States and the twenty-fourth largest city in the state of California. The 2010 US Census reported the city's population grew 16.7% from the year 2000 to 176,320 residents. It is located about northwest of downtown...
, located in northwestern Los Angeles County, California
Los Angeles County, California
Los Angeles County is a county in the U.S. state of California. As of 2010 U.S. Census, the county had a population of 9,818,605, making it the most populous county in the United States. Los Angeles County alone is more populous than 42 individual U.S. states...
, United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
.
Canyon Country is north of the San Fernando Valley
San Fernando Valley
The San Fernando Valley is an urbanized valley located in the Los Angeles metropolitan area of southern California, United States, defined by the dramatic mountains of the Transverse Ranges circling it...
via Newhall Pass through the Santa Susana
Santa Susana Mountains
The Santa Susana Mountains are a transverse range of mountains in southern California, north of the city of Los Angeles, in the United States. The range runs east-west separating the San Fernando Valley and Simi Valley on its south, from Santa Clara River Valley to the north, and Santa Clarita...
and San Gabriel Mountains
San Gabriel Mountains
The San Gabriel Mountains Range is located in northern Los Angeles County and western San Bernardino County, California, United States. The mountain range lies between the Los Angeles Basin and the Mojave Desert, with Interstate 5 to the west and Interstate 15 to the east...
. Canyon Country is located in the upper watershed
Drainage basin
A drainage basin is an extent or an area of land where surface water from rain and melting snow or ice converges to a single point, usually the exit of the basin, where the waters join another waterbody, such as a river, lake, reservoir, estuary, wetland, sea, or ocean...
of the Santa Clara River
Santa Clara River (California)
The Santa Clara River is approximately long, located in southern California in the United States. It drains an area of the coastal mountains north of Los Angeles. The Santa Clara is one of the largest river systems along the coast of Southern California and one of only a few remaining river...
in the Santa Clarita Valley
Santa Clarita Valley
The Santa Clarita Valley is the valley of the Santa Clara River in Southern California. It stretches through Los Angeles County and Ventura County. Its main population center is the city of Santa Clarita. The valley was part of the Rancho San Francisco Mexican land grant...
and Sierra Pelona Mountains
Sierra Pelona Mountains
The Sierra Pelona Mountains , or the Sierra Pelona Ridge, is a mountain range in the Transverse Ranges of Southern California.. They are located within Los Angeles and Kern Counties.-Geography:...
foothills.
History
The area was the ancestral homeland of the TataviamTataviam
The Tataviam , were called the Alliklik by their neighbors the Chumash , are a Native American group in southern California...
people for over five hundred years, and other tribes before then, such as the Tongva, Kitanemuk
Kitanemuk
The Kitanemuk were a Native American tribe and people who lived in the Tehachapi Mountains and the Antelope Valley area of the western Mojave Desert of southern California, United States.-Language:...
, and Serrano people. After the Spanish invasion the valley first became grazing lands of the Mission San Fernando Rey de España
Mission San Fernando Rey de España
Mission San Fernando Rey de España was founded on "The Feast of the Birth of Mary" , 1797. The settlement is located on the former Encino Rancho in the Mission Hills community of northern Los Angeles, near the site of the first gold discovery in Alta California.-History:Mission San Fernando Rey de...
around 1790. In 1834, after Mexican Independence, it became part of the Rancho San Francisco
Rancho San Francisco
Rancho San Francisco was a land grant in present day northwestern Los Angeles County and eastern Ventura County, California. It was of by Governor Juan B. Alvarado to Antonio del Valle, a Spanish army officer, in recognition for his service to the state of Alta California...
land grant centered on the confluence of the Santa Clara River and Castaic Creek
Castaic Creek
Castaic Creek is a stream in northern Los Angeles County, California. It is a tributary of the Santa Clara River.-Castaic Lake:Castaic Dam on the creek forms Castaic Lake, but most of the water comes from the West Branch of the California Aqueduct, also called the State Water Project. The lake is...
.
In the 1880s the rancho become the Newhall Ranch empire of Henry Newhall
Henry Newhall
Henry Mayo Newhall was an American businessman, whose extensive land holdings became the current communities of Newhall, Saugus, Valencia, and the city of Santa Clarita, in Southern California.-Life:...
, now the present day Newhall Land and Farming Company
Newhall Land and Farming Company
The Newhall Land and Farming Company is a land management company based in Valencia, California, United States. The company is responsible for the master community planning of Valencia, as well as the management of farm land elsewhere in the state...
. In 1928 the St. Francis Dam
St. Francis Dam
The St. Francis Dam was a concrete gravity-arch dam, designed to create a reservoir as a storage point of the Los Angeles Aqueduct. It was located 40 miles northwest of Los Angeles, California, near the present city of Santa Clarita....
collapsed, suddenly flooding and washing away settlements and people along the Santa Clara River section of present day Canyon Country. In the 1960s and 1970s the Newhall Land company's suburban developments transformed Canyon Country and the surrounding towns into a focused residential and cultural city.
Santa Clarita founding
In 1987, Canyon Country was one of four communities, with Valencia, NewhallNewhall, California
Newhall is the southernmost and oldest district of Santa Clarita, California. Prior to the 1987 consolidation of Valencia, Canyon Country, Saugus, Newhall, and other geographically proximate settlements into the conglomerate city of Santa Clarita, it was an independent but unincorporated town...
, and Saugus
Saugus, California
Saugus is a neighborhood in Santa Clarita, California. Saugus was one of the four communities that merged in 1987 to create the city of Santa Clarita. Saugus is named after Saugus, Massachusetts, the hometown of Henry Newhall, upon whose land the town was originally built...
, that merged to create the city of Santa Clarita, California
Santa Clarita, California
Santa Clarita is the fourth largest city in Los Angeles County, California, United States and the twenty-fourth largest city in the state of California. The 2010 US Census reported the city's population grew 16.7% from the year 2000 to 176,320 residents. It is located about northwest of downtown...
. The latitude of Canyon Country is 34.423N and the longitude is -118.471W . Canyon Country has a population of 59,530 people.
Canyon Country is home to the Placerita Canyon Nature Center, which is also the site of California's original gold discovery at the historic "Oak of the Golden Dream" in 1842 .
Services
The Los Angeles County Fire DepartmentLos Angeles County Fire Department
The Los Angeles County Fire Department , serves unincorporated parts of Los Angeles County, as well as 58 cities and towns that choose to have the county provide fire and EMS services, including La Habra. It should not be confused with the Los Angeles City Fire Department, which serves the city of...
Station 104 (Quint) and Station 107 (Engine and Paramedic Squad) serve the community.