Historic Orange Walking Tour

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Would anyone care to join Graph and I on the <a href="http://historicorange.org/">Orange Community Historical Society</a> walking tour this Sunday at 4?



WALKIN' AROUND TOWNE



The Orange Community Historical Society has opened the 2009 season of downtown Orange walking tours, which will run through October. The tours lead visitors through the heart of Old Towne Orange: the Plaza. Trained docents share the story of Orange?s founding, the significance of some of its downtown buildings (like the old opera house and the theater), and the fascinating evolution of Orange, once a small town known as Richland. (NOTE: Tours do not include private homes.)

OCHS will offer walking tours the second Saturday of the month at 10 a.m. and the fourth Sunday of the month at 4 p.m.



Following are the dates for the 2009 season:

10 a.m. on Saturday, June 13, July 11, August 8, September 12, October 10.

4 p.m. on Sunday, June 28, July 26, August 23, September 27, October 25.

Each tour lasts approximately 90 minutes. It is recommended that walkers wear comfortable shoes.

Tours start at the Orange Main Library and History Center, located at 407 E.. Chapman Ave.



Suggested donation of $5 goes to support Orange Community Historical Society programs like historical programs, the local history archives, preservation of historical photographs, and other history-related projects.



Tour reservations must be made at least two days in advance:

(714) 998-0330.



<a href="http://historicorange.org/walking_tours_2009.pdf">Flyer Here</a>
 
This sounds like a lot of fun but once again, little kid events get in the way. I hope a few people will be able to get out, the homes are so great over there.
 
Ummm... well... it was worth $5, but not much more than that. Maybe it was just our docent, but I didn't think that she was that knowledgeable, didn't delve into the history of the buildings/owners/economic time lines like I had expected, went off her notes too much, focused on dates but still confused me because some of it seemed to contradict what she said, and it was more about the commercial buildings vs the residential. She also told Cayci when she asked if she would talk about the church (that her grandparents got married in), that is now PJ Abbey's, no... because they have a brochure of the history of it. She did mention that Cayci's grandparents got married in there and quickly moved on, because the tour was ending. She had asked who was an Orange native, and I raised my hand, she then told me to interject if I wanted, but when I did interject about some facts of when they filmed "That Thing You Do", she ignored me and was more concerned about moving on making sure we were in the shade. Funny thing is, that movie completely changed the Plaza from what it was, to what it was for the movie, to what it is now. BK did show up with his daughter, and if he and I led the tour it would have been over two hours vs. the 90 minutes of her version. We could have kept her to interject with some points, but we could have focused on some more things that others would have seen as interesting. Like the Depot Walk, and how the facade had to blend in with the rest of the buildings even though it is a newly built project.



I did learn some things, and I will notice them now every time I am down at the Plaza. She was also pretty brave to know on the back door to the Sunkist building to see if Mr. Parker was there, he was, but he was about to leave so we didn't get to see the inside. I might take the tour again, with a different docent, and after I do some research on my own at the Orange library. It turns out there is a wealth of info there, plus she mentioned how they have some of the "old timers" on video now. Once I do some research, I may offer a tour on my own. Between what I have learned, and what I know, it would be worth $5 a person too. It would be worth $25 a person if BK would co-tour with me.
 
The docent just was not a dynamic speaker and she was reading her note cards. I could have done that with a self guided tour. I normally would raise all kind of questions to get the group dynamic going but she was not steering the group in the right direction. She was older and her speech had quite a bit of pauses.
 
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