Notable Natives and Residents
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Due to Orange County's proximity to Los Angeles, many film and media celebrities have moved or bought second homes in the county. Actor John Wayne, who lived in Newport Beach, is the namesake for Orange County's John Wayne Airport. Orange County has also produced many homegrown celebrities, including golfer Tiger Woods, basketball player Kobe Bryant, a number of professional ballplayers, including retired slugger Mark McGwire and pitching great Walter Johnson, WWE Wrestler, Chavo Guerrero Jr. actor, Kevin Costner, John Stamos, actor and radio personality R.J. Adams a.k.a. Bob Shannon, comedian/actors Steve Martin and Will Ferrell, actresses Michelle Pfeiffer and Diane Keaton, and singers Chester Bennington, Bonnie Raitt, Gwen Stefani, Jeff Buckley, Marc Cherry, Drake Bell and Major League Ballhawk John Witt. Ms. America Susan Jeske is also a resident. Sublime, Avenged Sevenfold, Lit, No Doubt, Reel Big Fish, Social Distortion, The Offspring, Project 86, Atreyu, Jeffree Star, and Leo Fender (the inventor of the first commercially successful solid body electric guitars) also call Orange County home. MMA fighter Tito Ortiz is a resident of Huntington Beach which is stated in his entrance as the "Huntington Beach Badboy". British MMA fighter Michael Bisping also lives in Orange County.
The county's most famous resident was perhaps Richard Nixon, the 37th President of the United States, who was born in Yorba Linda and lived in San Clemente for several years following his resignation. His presidential library is in Yorba Linda.
Orange County was also home to The Righteous Brothers: Bill Medley of Santa Ana, and Bobby Hatfield of Anaheim. The Santa Ana High School auditorium now bears Medley's name. Another less well-known sports figure from a previous era was Clifford C. Cravath, for many years judge of the Laguna Beach Municipal Court. Known as "Gavvy" Cravath as a professional baseball player from 1910 to 1920, he was the major league home run king prior to Babe Ruth's emergence as a slugger.
Read more about this topic: Orange County, California
Famous quotes containing the words notable, natives and/or residents:
“Every notable advance in technique or organization has to be paid for, and in most cases the debit is more or less equivalent to the credit. Except of course when it’s more than equivalent, as it has been with universal education, for example, or wireless, or these damned aeroplanes. In which case, of course, your progress is a step backwards and downwards.”
—Aldous Huxley (1894–1963)
“If a foreign country doesn’t look like a middle-class suburb of Dallas or Detroit, then obviously the natives must be dangerous as well as badly dressed.”
—Lewis H. Lapham (b. 1935)
“Most of the folktales dealing with the Indians are lurid and romantic. The story of the Indian lovers who were refused permission to wed and committed suicide is common to many places. Local residents point out cliffs where Indian maidens leaped to their death until it would seem that the first duty of all Indian girls was to jump off cliffs.”
—For the State of Iowa, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)