Portola, California

Portola is the only incorporated city in Plumas County, California, United States. The population was 2,104 at the 2010 census, down from 2,227 at the 2000 census. Portola is located on the Middle Fork of the Feather River, and was named after Spanish explorer Gaspar de Portolá, despite his never having actually explored the surrounding area. The place name is generally mispronounced, with stress on the middle syllable, thus ignoring the accent mark in its namesake's surname.

Portola is a crew change site on the Western Pacific Railroad (now Union Pacific Railroad) Feather River Route over the Sierra Nevada mountains. The city is also home to the Western Pacific Railroad Museum (formerly Portola Railroad Museum), one of the largest railroad museums in the Western US. The museum is famous for its Run A Locomotive program, where the public can participate in a "fantasy experience" program allowing them to run a railroad locomotive on the museum grounds.

Portola was in the national media spotlight in 1996–1997 when a conflict occurred between the local community and the Department of Fish and Game over how to deal with an invasive species of Northern Pike in Lake Davis. The lake was chemically treated in 1997 to eradicate the fish, but they reappeared in 1999. In early September 2007, the California Department of Fish and Game eradicated the pike using CFT Legumine, a new liquid formulation of rotenone .

California (1927 film)

California is a 1927 American Western silent film directed by W. S. Van Dyke and written by Marian Ainslee, Ruth Cummings and Frank Davis. The film stars Tim McCoy, Dorothy Sebastian, Marc McDermott, Frank Currier and Fred Warren. The film was released on May 7, 1927, by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

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341 California

341 California is an asteroid belonging to the Flora family in the Main Belt, that has an unusually high albedo.

It was discovered by Max Wolf on September 25, 1892 in Heidelberg.

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Etymology of California

California is a place name used by three North American states: in the United States by the state of California, and in Mexico by the states of Baja California and Baja California Sur. Collectively, these three areas constitute the region formerly referred to as Las Californias. The name California is shared by many other places in other parts of the world whose names derive from the original. The name "California" was applied to the territory now known as the state of California by one or more Spanish explorers in the 16th century and was probably a reference to a mythical land described in a popular novel of the time: Las Sergas de Esplandián. Several other origins have been suggested for the word "California", including Spanish, Latin, South Asian, and Aboriginal American origins. All of these are disputed.

California originally referred to the entire region composed of the Baja California peninsula now known as Mexican Baja California and Baja California Sur, and upper mainland now known as the U.S. states of California and parts of Nevada, Utah, Arizona, and Wyoming. After Mexico's independence from Spain, the upper territory became the Alta California province. In even earlier times, the boundaries of the Sea of Cortez and the Pacific Ocean coastlines were only partially explored and California was shown on early maps as an island. The Sea of Cortez is also known as the Gulf of California.