Oak Glen and Los Rios Rancho

Images of America: California

by J.R. Sanders

The 500-acre Los Rios Rancho has operated through a greater century as the largest apple orchard in Southern California and the centerpiece of Oak Glen, the heart of a dozen orchards on the southern slopes of the San Bernardino Range about eight miles from Yucaipa. Los Rios Rancho is owned by the Wildlands Conservancy, a privately funded corporation headquartered at Oak Glen since 1996 that has purchased more than 750,000 California acres to preserve as natural landscapes for public benefit. The ranch is leased today to the Devon Riley family, which carries on in the tradition of the ranch's founder, H. L. Rivers. The Rivers family--la familia de los Rios--has been a fruit label name known throughout California grocery stores and roadside stands since before World War I. In this collection, more than 180 vintage photographs pay tribute to the Rivers, Wilshire, and other family orchards at Oak Glen over the years.

128 pages, Paperback

First published August 21, 2006

About the author

Award-winning author J.R. Sanders is a native Midwesterner and longtime denizen of the L.A. suburbs.

His nonfiction articles appear in such periodicals as Law & Order and Wild West magazines. His books include Some Gave All, which gives true accounts of forgotten Old West lawmen killed in the line of duty.

J.R.’s first Nate Ross novel, Stardust Trail - a detective story set among the B-Western film productions of 1930s Hollywood - was a 2021 Spur Award Finalist (Best Western Historical Novel) and Silver Falchion Finalist (Best Investigator). His second Nate Ross novel, Dead-Bang Fall, won the 2023 Shamus Award (Best Original PI Paperback). The third novel, Bring the Night, was a 2024 Shamus Award Finalist (Best Original PI Paperback).