WRFH/Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM - State Facts: California

Episode Date: September 5, 2024

Nate is joined by Nicole Sighiartau to talk all about California.

You're listening to State Facts on Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM. I'm your host, Nate Gallagher, and I'm joined by Hillsdale's resident in California, Nicole Sigertow. How are you? I'm doing today, Nicole. I'm doing pretty good, Nate. How are you? I'm good. So where are you from in California? I am from the Orange County area, which is in Southern California, kind of nestled, like in the middle of Los Angeles and San Diego. What is the capital of California? Sacramento.

When was California admitted to the union? It was right after the gold rush, so I think I'm going to say 1850. September 9th, 1850. Oh, okay, that's cool. That's like coming up. Do you know what number it was admitted? 31st. How about the population as of 2022? 39 million.

You guys are like super big. We are. We have a lot of illegal. immigrants, so that kind of raises the population quite a bit. How about the nickname of the state? We are the golden state, although we're slowly becoming less golden, in my opinion. So do you have a lot of old mining stuff, or do you like, or does that have been like bulldozed over for construction? Most of the mining operations were in northern California, so it's really not a big thing in the

southern part of the state. But like if you go up to the Sacramento area by Sutter's Mill, which is like where gold was first found, I believe they still have a lot of that relics in history. Our fourth grade history, like for the whole entire state, focus a lot on the gold rush, but we're not insane miners or anything, if that's what you're asking. How about the state motto? The state motto is Eureka, which means I found it, and that's kind of because of the gold fresh, because everyone find gold and be like, Eureka! How about the state animal?

The grizzly bear, which is featured prominently on our flag. And it's actually interesting because California doesn't have any grizzly bears anymore. They stopped existing there a long time ago. But we do have lots of black bears. And if you go into the Sierra Nevada Mountains or Yosemite National Park specifically, they have all these boxes where you're supposed to put your food called bear boxes. And yeah, I've seen quite a few bears in that area before. And they're very docile and kind of boring.

Like they're just walking around and not doing a whole lot. How about the state flower? Oh, the state flower is the California poppy. They're beautiful. We don't have a ton in Southern California. Normally in the springtime, March is peak flower season in California primarily because it does get hot in the summer. so they'll all die off.

But I normally go try to find poppies in my local areas, and we don't have a ton. If you want really good poppies, I've heard you have to go up towards Santa Barbara, which I've been in the fall, but I've never been there around springtime, so I should really do that to go find some poppies. How about the state tree?

Oh, the state tree is the Redwood, and we have a whole national park dedicated to the Redwoods. And I went when I was really little, I was six or seven. I mean, my parents just took me to all the national parks, but I remember going with some extended family and just walking around these trees, and they were so incredibly tall.

Like, it truly is insane how tall they are. How about the state fish? It's the golden trout. It's the golden trout. Sticking with the gold theme. You guys got a lot of gold stuff, which you'd expect, person I'd expect more from, like, Colorado. It's like nuggets.

Yeah. Well, so it's, interesting, I went fishing with my dad one time when I was 11, right before, like, you had to get a fishing license. We kind of pushed my age with the fishing license. I'm just exposing myself at this point. But anyway, within 30 minutes, I had caught the limit, which was six fish, and they were all trout. And so we had six massive trout for just my dad and I. And I also don't like to eat trout, so then my dad got to eat six trout for dinner. You're like a master fisherwoman. How How is this possible?

I'm not, though. I just got so lucky because then we went again the next day. I still caught six, but it took a lot longer. Well, I think that's all the time we have. Thanks for coming on the show, Nicole. Thank you so much for having me. This was so fun. I've been Nate Gallagher with State Facts on Radio Free Hillsdale, 101.7 FM.

See you next time.