The official center of the world is in Felicity (California), a very small town with just a couple of houses that was founded by the French ex-parachutists François Istel. The town's key features are a 21-foot-tall stone-and-glass pyramid, a church on a man-made hill, and the Museum of History in Granite, which Istel has been developing since the town's founding. It was declared the official center of the world by the Imperial County Board of Supervisors in 1985.