Watson got to do what few other architects and planners have,craft a city around a new university. Watson was The Irvine Company’s first planner and designed some of Irvine’s first villages, right about the time the University of California, Irvine, was taking shape. Watson went on to serve as president of the Irvine Co. in the 1970s and served as a director before retiring in 2003. Last month, he was presented with the UC Irvine Medal for his contributions to the university. He reflected on the early days of UCI and Irvine at an Oct. 22 awards dinner.
The journey that brought the University of California, Irvine, and The Irvine Company together began in 1957,49 years ago.
The university needed more campuses, and the Irvine Co. needed to open up its vast ranch to development.
By 1959, university consultants had identified 20 sites in Orange and southern L.A. counties. Seven of those sites were on the Irvine Ranch. The university and company authorized William Pereira to establish the feasibility of developing a campus and surrounding community on one of the Irvine sites.
On June 20, 1960, company shareholders met and agreed to offer the university a gift of 1,000 acres for a new campus and to build a new town around it. The university quickly accepted the offer,and Pereira’s vision of a new town and campus growing simultaneously in support of each other gave direction to the company and became the compelling vision that has guided the growth of town and gown to this day.
It also is that vision that enticed me in 1960 to join the Irvine Co. as a planner,a company six months earlier I had never heard of,and move my family to a county I knew only as the home of Disneyland. But to an architect/planner, the opportunity to work for a company that owned 93,000 acres debt-free and proposing to build a new town around a new University of California campus was overwhelming.
Today, the city of Irvine has a population in excess of 180,000 and UC Irvine has a student population approaching 25,000. Each enjoys national, and in some quarters international, reputations. The new town, Irvine, is often mentioned as one of the most successful new communities planned and built in the 20th century. And UCI has become one of the great universities in the country.
That has all happened because of the dedicated work of thousands of individuals working for the company and university.
The successes are also the work of more than our two institutions. It is also the work of our city government formed in 1971, Irvine’s outstanding unified school district formed in 1972 and Irvine’s many community and civic associations.
And, if I can be allowed to exercise a personal privilege and mention two individuals to whom we owe an enormous debt for the successes of both town and gown. They are Dan Aldrich, UCI’s first chancellor, whose steady hands and leadership allowed this campus to enjoy reputation and growth in the turbulent 1960s; and the Irvine Co.’s chairman, Don Bren, who bought out his partners in 1983 and has raised the level of planning, design and vision of town and gown beyond anything I perceived during my tour of running the company.
And the event that most illustrates what Bren has contributed to the town and region occurred on Oct. 10 when the National Park Service director announced that 37,000 acres of the Irvine Ranch had been designated as a National Natural Landmark, a portion of the ranch that is larger than the city of San Francisco. And to be sure to provide the support that is needed to preserve and still allow public access to this beautiful part of the ranch, Bren created an endowment of $50 million for the preserve.
It is to all of those who have supported this great institution during the past 46 years, it is you this medal belongs and I will proudly accept in your honor.
