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function CC_Message() {
var ar = new Array(
"Contra Costa County is nearly the size of Rhode Island.",
"John Marsh was the first American citizen to settle in today's Contra Costa County. ",
"Alamo was named after the many cottonwood trees lining San Ramon Creek. ",
"Before 1853 Contra Costa County included Alameda County.",
"An exploring party led by Pedro Fages reached the San Joaquin River near Antioch on March 30, 1776.",
"The Bidwell - Bartleson Party, the first American wagon train to reach California, arrived at the John Marsh Rancho on November 20, 1841.",
"Grizzly Adams once roamed Mount Diablo hunting wild game for the San Francisco market.",
"Port Costa was the world's leading wheat shipping port in the 1880's.",
"The last legal hanging in Contra Costa County took place at Martinez in 1874.",
"Government Ranch was never owned by the government.",
"The Pony Express rode through Contra Costa County.",
"Coal was discovered on Mount Diablo in 1859 during the cleaning of a spring.",
"In 1863 there was a copper, silver and gold rush on Mount Diablo. ",
"John Marsh was the first medical doctor to settle in Contra Costa County.",
"Elk and Prong Horn Antelopes were numerous in Contra Costa in the early 1850's.",
"Redwoods were logged in Contra Costa during the 1850's.",
"James Kirker, New Mexican gun fighter, led a band of hard-bitten Indian warriors who fought rustlers and hunted wild game in Contra Costa. ",
"Jack London was a frequent visitor to Contra Costa on board his famous yacht, Snark.",
"In the 1870's there was a famous range war between the Moraga family and the Carpentier land grabbing gang.",
"On December 1, 1862,  James Magee was shot  in the back by James Tice of Tice Valley during a dispute over a borrowed mare.",
"Tiburcio Vasquez, famous outlaw and womanizer, roamed the hills of Contra Costa.",
"Concord won incorporation as a town in February 17, 1905 by only two votes.  ",
"Byron Hot Springs was an important interrogation center for captured German and Japanese officers during the Second World War. ",
"The Carquinez Straits Bridge was opened on May 21, 1927.",
"Kirker Pass is named after James Kirker, fur trapper and Indian fighter.",
"While living in Contra Costa County, Eugene O'Neill wrote The Iceman Cometh, A Moon for the Misbegotten and the Pulitzer Prize-winning play, Long Day's Journey Into Night.",
"Contra Costa County was the site of the last whaling station in the United States. ",
"Captain Joseph R. Walker, famous mountain man, is buried in the Alhambra Cemetery in Martinez.",
"Bret Harte wrote 'The Devil and How Mount Diablo Got Its Name' after living in Contra Costa during the early 1880's.",
"The south cell block housing at San Quentin was built from stone quarried from Contra Costa's Brooks Island.",
"Many of the famed 'Black Widow' night fighter pilots trained at Concord's Buchanan Field (Concord Army Airfield) during WW II.",
"Clyde was built to provide housing for shipyard workers during WWI.",
"The 1865-66 California legislature changed the name of Mount Diablo to Coal Hill.  The name change was wisely ignored by everyone.",
"Vallejo proposed naming today's Contra Costa County, Mount Diablo County.",
"The last coal mine on Mount Diablo closed in 1902.",
"Coal mining on Mount Diablo lasted for 46 years.",
"The town of Pacheco flooded so often that the people eventually moved to Todos Santos (Concord).",
"Salvio Pacheco and Francisco Galindo built the town of Todos Santos (Concord).",
"Mount Diablo is 3,849 feet high.",
"Cow hides and tallow were the first commercial products produced in Contra Costa. ",
"The San Pablo Rancho, owned by the Castro family, was the first ranch in Contra Costa County.",
"A huge earthquake shook up  Contra Costa in 1868.",
"In 1860 there were only 5,132 people living in Contra Costa County.",
"From 1922 to 1930 pure silica sand was mined near Nortonville.",
"Over $20 million worth of coal was mined in Contra Costa County.",
"Lime was the first product shipped from Pacheco.",
"Wheat was once a major product of Contra Costa.",
"The first newspaper in Contra Costa was published in Martinez.",
"The Antioch Bridge was built in 1926.",
"Antioch was first called Smith's Landing.",
"The Shadelands Museum is located in Walnut Creek.",
"The Alvarado Adobe is located in San Pablo.",
"The Mount Diablo beacon is lit each year on the night of December 7, Pearl Harbor Day.",
"The largest Contra Costa city in 1940 was Richmond with a population of 22,707.",
"There were 5,815 automobiles registered in Contra Costa in 1920.",
"Pittsburg was once called New York of the Pacific.",
"In 1858 the Contra Costa Gazette, the first newspaper in Contra Costa County,  began publishing.",
"The John Muir House is located in Martinez.",
"The Black Diamond Park is the northern-most growing location of the Coulter Pine. ",
"Mountain lions find the deer in the Contra Costa hills very tasty.",
"American mountain men and the Hudson Bay Company trapped beaver, mink and muskrats in Contra Costa during the Mexican period.",
"The volunteer members of the Contra Costa Guards protected the county during the Civil War.",
"During the 1850's and 60's one of the most infamous den of Contra Costa bandits was located east of Danville in the Black Hills.",
"Joaquin Murrieta was a frequent visitor to Contra Costa from his outlaw hideout in Niles Canyon. ",
"In 1914 Sheriff Veale formed a river posse to attack the river pirates plaguing our local farmers and shippers.",
"Mt. Diablo became a State Park and Game Refuge on June 19, 1921.",
"In 1928 Standard Oil Company of California installed the beacon on top of Mt. Diablo that was lit by Charles Lindbergh.",
"Wild boars are common on Mount Diablo.",
"Hubert Bancroft, famous California historian, established one of the state's most successful fruit ranches in Walnut Creek.",
"In 1931 Clark Gable starred in the movie, Sporting Blood, made at Heather Farm in Ygnacio Valley.",
"The huge 1944 Port Chicago explosion killed 320 sailors, shattering windows as far away as Walnut Creek.",
"William Tecumseh Sherman laid out the original town that became Pittsburg.  He later became a famous Civil War general.",
"In 1915 PG&E built the Contra Costa power plant near Antioch.",
"Camp Stoneman was built in 1942.  Millions of soldiers were passed through the camp on their way to fight in World War Two and the Korean War.",
"William A. Leidesdorff, a black man, owned the land that now includes Lafayette as well as the first steamboat to sail on San Francisco Bay.",
"The San Pablo Rancho was also called 'Cuchiyunes.'",
"A socialist utopian colony, the Cooperative Brotherhood of Winter Island, was formed in 1893 with 100 members.",
"During the Civil War the Contra Costa Guard was formed to defend the county from Southern sympathizers.",
"A large monument, erected in the memory of those county citizens killed in WW I, was dedicated on December 11, 1924.",
"The 'Amee-Minnie' was the name of a giant snake seen in the river near Antioch in 1934.  After four months of growing panic, a group of local men confessed to creating the hoax.",
"The Bay Point and Clayton Railroad was incorporated on August 29, 1906.",
"Before Dr. Samuel Tennent came to Contra Costa, he was the personal physician to the ruler of Hawaii, King Kamehameha III.",
"A stagecoach road linking San Pablo to Martinez was completed in 1865.",
"In 1927 Moraga had the first dial telephone service in California with 40 subscribers.",
"North of St. Mary's College the cliffs along Bollinger Canyon Road contain footprints of mammoths.",
"Moraga was once seriously considered as the possible site for a permanent United Nations headquarters.  Strangely enough, New York City was selected as the home of the United Nations.",
"In the 1880's the early settlers around Oakley were called 'sand lappers.'",
"El Sobrante means 'the surplus' in Spanish.  Legally It was the unclaimed land between the great ranchos.",
"The California & Nevada Railroad reached Olinda in 1888.",
"In 1853 a giant grizzly killed one of William M. Mendenhall's milk cows in Sycamore Valley.",
"Felipe Briones was killed by Indians three miles east of Clayton.",
"In 1922 Jersey Island was the site of a famous robbery of a well known Chinese gambling hangout.",
"Todos Santos changed its name to Concord in 1869.",
"James Borland installed the first telephone system for Martinez in 1881.",
"During the first half of 1925, federal bounty hunters killed 167 coyotes and 72 wildcats in Contra Costa County.",
"In 1855 Joshua Bollinger came to Contra Costa and settled in Bollinger Canyon.",
"In 1854 Fred Babbe killed a grizzly and captured one of its cubs near today's Oakley."
)

var elts = ar.length-1
var now = new Date()
var sec = Math.floor(Math.random() * elts)
var factno = sec+1
alert("Contra Costa Fact " + factno + ": \r\r" + ar[sec])
}
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