Lynn Housouer, chief executive officer of Pioneers Park Museum in the Imperial Valley, is photographed at the museum’s entrance next to a statue of Mobley Meadows, the first sheriff of Imperial County. Pioneers Museum is dedicated to preserving and showcasing the hundred-plus year history of Imperial County. On Feb. 2, the museum will hold its annual Pioneers’ Day, a free event featuring activities that teach about the region’s history and the pioneers who turned a harsh desert into a landscape where crops and a community could flourish.

The year was 1928—a mere 20 years after pioneers founded Imperial County and turned a barren desert on the southeastern tip of California into a region where lands could become fertile and farming could prosper.

With the passing of the Boulder Canyon Project Act that year, which would lead to the construction of

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Major Antonio Horta and his wife, Major Iade Horta, who lead the El Centro Corps of The Salvation Army, are pictured by The Salvation Army’s iconic emblem outside the organization’s Church on Fourth Street in El Centro. On Wednesday, Nov. 21, The Salvation Army will serve its annual Thanksgiving meal to those in need from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. on Ross Avenue and Fourth Street in El Centro.

On a quiet street corner in El Centro sits a building that for decades has been a critical lifeline for the hungry and the needy—anyone in search of a little hope. That building is the headquarters for The Salvation Army and volunteers gather daily inside the kitchen to prepare hot lunches for those who otherwise might not have a chance at a meal.

Every day is busy for those in The

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Holtville Fire Chief Alex Silva (left) and Imperial County Fire Battalion Chief Angel Morales are pictured next to a Holtville Fire brush truck and county fire vehicle. The brush truck was used to help fight the Mendocino Complex Wildfire. Brush trucks have become a critical tool to reaching rugged terrain in the battle to stop raging brush fires.

When two Northern California wildfires joined to become a massive inferno known as the Mendocino Complex Fire, the largest wildfire in California’s history, thousands of firefighters from throughout the state joined in the fight to stop the blaze and protect human life and property.

Firefighters from the Imperial Valley were among them.

For more than a month, Valley firefighters have joined crews from throughout California—and even international crews—to slow a wildfire that has scorched more than 450,000 acres

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