Zócalo Public Square

10/8/2008 - Gustavo Arellano, the unofficial mascot of Orange County, talks to an L.A. crowd about their southern neighbor (he was surprised anyone showed up). From its settling by the Spaniards to today's popular television shows, residents of Orange County, California have always imagined their homeland as Eden on the Coast, a respite from urbanization, where one only needed to work, vote Republican, and hate Mexicans to partake in the American Dream. But behind this bucolic veneer is a more complex picture. OC Weekly staff writer Gustavo Arellano unveils the truth behind the OC (don't call it that) by discussing his new book, Orange County: A Personal History, a history of the biggest little county in America as seen through four generations of his Mexican family.