Hemet Valley Mall

Hemet is a city in the San Jacinto Valley in Riverside County, California. It covers a total area of 29.3 square miles (76 km2), about half of the valley, which it shares with the neighboring city of San Jacinto. The population was 89,833 at the 2020 census. The founding of Hemet, initially called South San Jacinto, predates the formation of Riverside County. This area was then still part of San Diego County. The formation of Lake Hemet helped the city to grow and stimulated agriculture in the area. The city is known for being the home of The Ramona Pageant, California's official outdoor play set in the Spanish colonial era. Started in 1923, the play is one of the longest-running outdoor plays in the United States. Hemet has been named a Tree City USA for 20 years by the Arbor Day Foundation for its dedication to the local forest. The city is home to the Hemet Valley Medical Center, a 320-bed general hospital.

Area code 951 is a telephone area code in the North American Numbering Plan for western Riverside County in the southern part of the U.S. state of California. It was assigned in 2004 to a new numbering plan area that was created by an area code split of area code 909.

The Hemet Public Library is a public library in Hemet, California, United States which opened its current building in July 2003.

Established in August 2007, Tahquitz High School (Tah-quitz) is a high school of approximately 1700 students on the northwestern side of Hemet, California operated by the Hemet Unified School District. The high school's mascot is a 'titan warrior' school colors are green and gold. Kari McGowan was the school principal at the start of the 2023-2024 school year.The high school served as an evacuation center during the Fairview Fire of September 2022.

Hemet-Ryan Airport (IATA: HMT, ICAO: KHMT, FAA LID: HMT) is three miles (6 km) southwest of Hemet, in Riverside County, California.Hemet-Ryan is a main Cal Fire Air Attack Base, also used for civil purposes, Civil Air Patrol meetings, and more. It is home to a Riverside County Sheriff's Office aviation unit and a Mercy Air Air ambulance. The airport is named after the late T. Claude Ryan.

West Valley High School is a high school that serves around 1,800 students on the western side of Hemet, California. The school is accredited by the WASC Accrediting Commission for Schools and also has become an AVID Demonstration School. The West Valley High School mascot is a Mustang.

The Western Science Center (WSC), formerly the Western Center for Archaeology & Paleontology, is a museum located near Diamond Valley Lake in Hemet, California. The WSC is home to a large collection of Native American artifacts and Ice Age fossils that were unearthed at Diamond Valley Lake, including "Max", the largest mastodon found in the western United States, and "Xena", a Columbian mammoth, as well as dinosaur fossils recovered from New Mexico. Opened in 2006, the museum has been designed to provide world-class facilities for the research, curation, and presentation of the nearly one million specimens discovered during the development of Diamond Valley Lake in Hemet.

Rancho San Jacinto Viejo was a 35,503-acre (143.68 km2) Mexican land grant in present-day Riverside County, California given in 1842 by Governor Pro-tem Manuel Jimeno to José Antonio Estudillo. At the time of the US Patent, Rancho San Jacinto Viejo was a part of San Diego County. The County of Riverside was created by the California Legislature in 1893 by taking land from both San Bernardino and San Diego Counties. The grant encompassed present-day Hemet and San Jacinto.

San Jacinto ( SAN hə-SIN-toh, -⁠ jə-, -⁠ yə-, Spanish: [saŋ xaˈsinto]; Spanish for 'St. Hyacinth') is a city in Riverside County, California, United States. It is located at the north end of the San Jacinto Valley, with Hemet to its south and Beaumont, California, to its north. The mountains associated with the valley are the San Jacinto Mountains. The population was 44,199 at the 2010 census. The city was founded in 1870 and incorporated on April 20, 1888, making it one of the oldest cities in Riverside County. The city is home to Mt. San Jacinto College, a community college founded in 1965. San Jacinto will also be home to the eastern end of the Mid County Parkway, a planned route that would eventually connect it to the city of Perris. In the late 19th century and early 20th century, the city became a home to many dairies, and a center for agriculture. San Jacinto also is home to the Soboba Casino, a gaming casino owned and operated by the Soboba Band of Luiseño Indians. The Sobobas are sovereign and self-sufficient in community affairs. They operate an Indian tribal school, the Noli Academy.

The San Jacinto Valley is a valley located in Riverside County, in Southern California, in the Inland Empire. The valley is located at the base of the San Jacinto Mountains in the east and Santa Rosa Hills to the south with the San Gorgonio Pass to the north. The average elevation is 1,500 feet (460 m), with the highest points in the foothills south of Hemet and the western slopes of the San Jacinto Mountains. It is home to two cities, Hemet and San Jacinto, and several unincorporated communities. According to the 2020 census, the valley has a combined population of over 190,000 residents, including more than 143,000 residents within the city limits of Hemet and San Jacinto. The valley is also where the story and play "Ramona" was set; the story was written after author Helen Hunt Jackson visited the valley in the 1880s. The valley is also known for being an area of agriculture, which has given way to more urbanized development.

San Jacinto High School is the only major public high school in the city of San Jacinto, California. The other high school in San Jacinto, Mountain View High School, is a small alternative school located near San Jacinto High's campus. San Jacinto High is part of the San Jacinto Unified School District and is located on 17 acres (68,796 m2) on the southeast side of San Jacinto close to the border of Hemet. San Jacinto High, which serves all of San Jacinto, was founded in 1910.

The Pochea Indian village site was the home of the Pochea Indians in what is now Hemet, California in Riverside County, California. The Pochea Indian village site was designated a California Historic Landmark (No.104) on March 29, 1933. The site of the Pochea Indian village is currently at the Ramona Bowl at 27400 Ramona Bowl, Hemet, California. The Pochea Indians lived in a small groups. These groups made up the indigenous peoples of California group called Pahsitnah. In 1774 the Juan Bautista de Anza expedition stopped at the Pochea Indian village during the expedition. Someone in the expedition had smallpox that was passed to a Pochea member. A smallpox epidemic broke out and spread. Those that did not die moved to the present day Soboba Reservation, home of the Soboba Band of Luiseno Indians. Juan Bautista de Anza was the leader of an exploratory expedition on January 8, 1774, with 3 padres, 20 soldiers, 11 servants, 35 mules, 65 cattle, and 140 horses set forth from Tubac south of present-day Tucson, Arizona. They went across the Sonoran desert to California from Mexico by swinging south of the Gila River to avoid Apache attacks until they hit the Colorado River at the Yuma Crossing—about the only way across the Colorado River. The friendly Quechan (Yuma) Indians (2–3,000) he encountered there were growing most of their food, using irrigation systems, and had already imported pottery, horses, wheat and a few other crops from New Mexico.After crossing the Colorado to avoid the impassable Algodones Dunes west of Yuma, Arizona, they followed the river about 50 miles (80 km) south (to about the Arizona's southwest corner on the Colorado River) before turning northwest to about today's Mexicali, Mexico and then turning north through today's Imperial Valley and then northwest again before reaching Mission San Gabriel Arcángel near the future city of Los Angeles, California. It took Anza about 74 days to do this initial reconnaissance trip to establish a land route into California. On his return trip he went down the Gila River until hitting the Santa Cruz River (Arizona) and continuing on to Tubac. The return trip only took 23 days, and he encountered several peaceful and populous agricultural tribes with irrigation systems located along the Gila River.