Sitting at the south end of the Mohave Desert, Apple Valley in California, is located in San Bernardino County. Blessed with abundant sunshine, the photovoltaics Apple Valley is a real solar hot spot, boasting ten solar technology companies servicing its 73,000 residents.
City cheerleader, Ursula Poates, was responsible for giving the town its name. Determined to put the place on the map, Ursula planted a trio of apple trees in her back garden for the purpose of convincing folk the land was orchard-friendly. Indeed, Apple Valley was famous for its apple orchards for a while. A famous apple grower, Max Ihmsen of the LA Examiner nurtured more than three hundred acres of fruit trees.
Actor Victor Buono, who appeared alongside Joan Crawford and Bette Davis in the creepy thriller, ‘Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?’ is one of the town’s more famous residents. He starred again with Davis in the equally spine-chilling film, ‘Hush, Hush, Sweet Charlotte’. Born in 1938 in San Diego, Buono died of a heart attack in 1982. This larger than life actor also appeared on American television screens in the series, ‘Batman’ as the character, King Tut.
Other local notables were country and western singers Roy Rogers and wife, Dale Evans. Famous for starting the band, the ‘Sons of the Pioneers’, the pair of animal lovers are also renown for having their pets posthumously mounted. Their horses, Trigger and Buttermilk along with their dog, Bullet, all made appearances in the family museum before it closed in 1999.
Richard Nixon, 37th American President, wrote his early memoirs while a guest at the home of Newton T Bass, the town’s founder. Over a three-month period, Nixon chronicled the 1960 election campaign against John Kennedy, the Kitchen Debate with Russian Premier Nikita Kruschev and the Alger Hiss spy trial in a book entitled ‘Six Crises’.
Skip Young was a fairly regular fixture on American television screens between 1956 and 1965 as a friend of Ricky and David Nelson in the hit family sitcom, ‘The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet’. Born in 1930, Young died at his home in from complications due to diabetes.
Apple Valley has also produced its share of notable sportsmen and musicians. Seattle Mariner pitcher, Jason Vargas, golfer Billy Casper and John W Henry, owner of the Boston Red Sox all topped up their suntans from time to time. Along with country and western group, the ‘Sons of the Pioneers’ founded by Leonard Skye (alias, ‘Roy Rogers’), the town also played home to Van Connor of ‘Screaming Trees’ fame and slash band, Slayer’s drummer, Dave Lombardo.
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