Editing Mission Viejo, California (section)

==History==
[[File:Don Juan Forster - Pg-461.jpg|thumb|left|Don [[Juan Forster]] purchased [[Rancho Mission Viejo|Rancho Misión Vieja]] in 1845.]]
[[Rancho Mission Viejo]] was purchased by [[Juan Forster|Don Juan Forster]], an English-born Mexican ranchero.<ref>{{Cite web | url=http://sjchistoricalsociety.com/content/don-juan-forster/ | title=Don Juan Forster – SJC Historical Society }}</ref> During the [[Mexican–American War]], Forster provided fresh horses to United States military forces which were used on the march of San Diego to invade Los Angeles.

Mission Viejo was a hilly region primarily used as cattle and sheep [[grazing]] land, since it was of little use to farmers. This city was one of the last regions of Orange County to be urbanized due to its geologic complexity. In 1960, early developers dismissed most of the land in Mission Viejo as simply "undevelopable".<ref name=Epting>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_U7xVtLFR1gC&pg=PA33 |title=Vanishing Orange County |page=33 |first=Chris |last=Epting |publisher=[[Arcadia Publishing]] |date=2008 |access-date=March 8, 2011|isbn=9780738559742 }}</ref>

[[Donald Bren]], an urban planner who later became the president of the [[Irvine Company]], drafted a master plan which placed roads in the valleys and houses on the hills, and contoured to the geography of the area.<ref name=Epting/> The plan worked, and by 1980 much of the city of Mission Viejo was completed. During the late 1970s and the 1980s, houses in Mission Viejo were in such high demand that housing tracts often sold out before construction even began on them.<ref>{{cite news|title=Rebels Dig In to Defend Last Ridge in South : Growth: The city carved out by the Mission Viejo Co. is on edge over the developer's final step. The company's offer of recreational land may not be enough to take Naciente Ridge. |date=May 27, 1990|first1=FRANK |last1=MESSINA |first2=WENDY |last2=PAULSON |newspaper=[[Los Angeles Times]]|access-date=March 8, 2016 |url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1996-06-17-me-15934-story.html}}</ref> The houses and shopping centers in the city are almost uniformly designed in a Spanish mission style, with "adobe"-like stucco walls and barrel-tile roofs. Many point to Mission Viejo as the first and largest manifestation of Bren's obsession with [[Spanish architecture]]. Bren's company was also the creator of the developments in [[Irvine, California|Irvine]] and [[Newport Beach, California|Newport Beach]]. The company expanded its operations and went on to build the Lakes project in [[Tempe, Arizona]] and [[Mission Viejo, Aurora, Colorado|Mission Viejo Aurora]], and was the initial master planner of [[Highlands Ranch]], both located in the [[Denver metropolitan area|Denver, Colorado Metropolitan area]].

The seal of the city of Mission Viejo was designed and drawn by Carl Glassford, an artist and former resident of the city.