James Irvine (landowner)

James Irvine (1867 - 1947) (James Irvine II) was an agricultural pioneer and prominent landowner in California. His father, James Irvine I (1827-1886) emigrated from Belfast, Ireland to the United States in the 1840s, following the Great Irish Famine, with the intent of joining the California Gold Rush. En route, he was approached by a fellow traveler named Benjamin Flint, and they purchased the Rancho San Joaquin, which had fallen into foreclosure after a severe drought. James Irvine I married Henrietta (Nettie) Rice in 1867, who was the daughter of prominent Cleveland, Ohio educator, writer, poet and State Senator Harvey Rice. Harvey Rice was a descendant from the Deacon Edmund Rice family who founded Marlborough and Sudbury, Massachusetts.

Subsequent to his father's death, James II fomed the Irvine Company upon his buyout of Flint and the other partners. Irvine himself lived in San Francisco until the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, which forced his permanent relocation to the Ranch. He established the James Irvine Foundation in 1937, an entity dedicated to the "general well-being of the citizens and residents of the state of California." He owned nearly a third of the land in present day Orange County, California, and was the father of James Irvine III ("Jase", James Irvine Jr.)(1894-1935). He died of Bright's disease in 1947. The city of Irvine, California is named after him.

External links

* [http://www.irvine.org/ The James Irvine Foundation]
* [http://www.ci.irvine.ca.us/about/history.asp History of Irvine, CA]