Willow Glen is a neighborhood of San Jose, California, in Santa Clara County. Geographically speaking, the Willow Glen neighborhood is centered around Lincoln Avenue, which was re-named from its previous name of "Willow Glen Road" in 1865 shortly after President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated.

By 1863 the small unincorporated community needed its first school. Willow Glen Elementary School was founded in 1863. Willow Glen continued as an unincorporated community until the 1920s, when the City of San Jose ordered the Southern Pacific Railroad to re-route the Southern Pacific Railroad trunk line which at that time was going down Fourth Street. The Southern Pacific then proposed to re-route down Lincoln Avenue. In order to forestall that attempt, Willow Glen was incorporated as a city in 1927. The railroad was instead re-routed to its current route through a then-unincorporated area now known as North Willow Glen, where its principal user is now Caltrain.

Being a city, however, required thinking about issues such as sewage. Willow Glen had no sewer system -- individual homes had their own cesspool or septic system. Because the area was marshy before being drained for Willow Glen, the high water table resulted in raw sewage often spilling above-ground from flooded cesspools. Rather than build their own very expensive sewage treatment system, Willow Glen's residents took a vote to be annexed to San Jose and be linked to San Jose's sewage system. This occurred in 1936. Today Willow Glen's historic downtown on Lincoln Avenue between Willow Street and Minnesota Avenue is a well-known "walkable" downtown community, with a variety of restaurants and shops.

Cambrian Park is a former census-designated place (CDP) and neighborhood of San Jose, a city in Santa Clara County, California, United States. Formerly a separate town, it is now part of the incorporated city of San Jose.
The population was 3,258 at the 2000 census.

According to the United States Census Bureau, the CDP had a total area of 0.6 square miles (1.6 km²), all of it land. Not all of the general area today considered "Cambrian Park" lies within San Jose's city limits. A large swath of the neighborhood remains an unincorporated "island" that is administered by Santa Clara County. Recent changes in annexation laws in the State of California that streamlined the process of cities acquiring neighborhoods did not affect this unincorporated area because its population was too large. Thus, if the city of San Jose ever decides to annex the "county island," the annexation must be accepted by the majority of the population of the area to be annexed.

Almaden Valley (often just called Almaden) is a neighborhood of about 37,000 in the southwestern portion of San Jose, California, roughly equivalent to the 95120 ZIP Code. The neighborhood is south east of the town of Los Gatos, west of the Santa Teresa neighborhood of San Jose and south of Coleman Ave. at the southern end of the Blossom Hill neighborhood of San Jose. It is named after the New Almaden Mines, which were named after the mercury mine in (old) Almadén, Spain.  The informal borders are generally Coleman Rd. at the northern end, McKean Rd. at the southern end, where the valley becomes mostly rural, and the town of Los Gatos to the west. The valley is located between a small series of hills and the Santa Cruz Mountains, with Mount Umunhum to the west dominating the local geography.

Like its Spanish namesake, California's Almaden had a number of quicksilver mines. The mercury was used during gold extraction in the California Gold Rush, but the mines were closed in 1975 and have been converted into Almaden Quicksilver County Park. Despite the closure of the mines, there still remains a high mercury content in the nearby soil, creeks and rivers, and signs are posted alongside them warning people not to eat the fish. Even still, many of the names in Almaden still retain their mercury mine themes. For example, there are streets called Silver Lode Lane and Silver Mine Drive (the latter of which was renamed). Also, many places in Almaden still use the name Quicksilver.

As part of the Silicon Valley, the main industry in the neighborhood is now high technology research and development; IBM Almaden Research Center is located there. The neighborhood is primarily upper class, with homes owned by local professionals, scientists, athletes, and Silicon Valley executives.

Santa Teresa is a neighborhood in the south of San Jose, California, USA. It is east of Almaden Valley, surrounding Santa Teresa Boulevard, with access to Highway 85. Santa Teresa County Park borders the neighborhood. The Santa Teresa area is home to the Bernal-Gulnac-Joice Ranch, a historic ranch on the border of the southern hills about a dozen blocks west of one entrance to Santa Teresa County Park. The ranch was once an important one, holding many Spanish farmers and Ohlone Indians. This ranch provided fruit, dairy products, and spring water to nearby homes and neighborhoods and even as far away as downtown San Jose. Today, it is a county park with hiking trails, cultural education, and recreational activities. Santa Teresa, mostly suburban neighborhoods, also includes several schools from the Oak Grove School District, including Santa Teresa Elementary and Bernal Intermediate School.

The Evergreen area of San Jose, California, is a large district of Southeast San Jose. Its boundaries are roughly Tully Road to the north, US 101 to the west, San Felipe Road to the south and the East Foothills neighborhood on the eastern edge.

The population is largely Hispanic in the western portions, and there is a very large Asian population in the eastern areas of Evergreen. Western Evergreen neighborhoods tend to be lower-middle class to middle class, while the Eastern areas of Evergreen are upper-middle class to upper-class. The western areas of Evergreen are some of the higher crime areas of San Jose, while the southeastern area of Evergreen is home to multi-million dollar homes and the gated Silver Creek Valley Country Club. Most of Evergreen is suburban residential development, with many strip malls and shopping centers. Evergreen Valley College is located near the eastern edge of Evergreen.

San Jose (meaning St. Joseph in Spanish) is the third-largest city in California, and the tenth-largest in the United States. San Jose is located at the southern end of the Bay Area, a region commonly referred to as Silicon Valley. It is the county seat of Santa Clara County. Once a small farming city, San Jose became a magnet for suburban newcomers in new housing developments between the 1960s and 1990s, and is now the largest city in Northern California. The United States Census Bureau estimates the city's population to be 939,899, and the Metropolitan area to contain approximately 1.8 million residents.

El Pueblo de San José de Guadalupe, San Jose was founded on November 29, 1777 as the first town in the Spanish colony of Nueva California, which later became Alta California. The city served as a farming community to support Spanish military installations at San Francisco and Monterey. When California gained statehood in 1850, San Jose served as its first capital. After more than 150 years as an agricultural center, San Jose experienced increased demand for housing from soldiers and other veterans returning from World War II, as well as aggressive expansion during the 1950s and 1960s by annexing more land area. By the 1990s, San Jose's location within the booming local technology industry earned the city the nickname Capital of Silicon Valley.

Prior to western settlement, the area was inhabited by several groups of Ohlone Native Americans. The first lasting European presence began with a series of Franciscan missions established from 1769 by Father Junípero Serra. On orders from Antonio María de Bucareli y Ursúa, Spanish Viceroy of New Spain, San Jose was founded by Lieutenant José Joaquín Moraga as Pueblo de San José de Guadalupe (in honor of Saint Joseph) on November 29, 1777, to establish a farming community. The town was the first civil settlement in Alta California. In 1797, the pueblo was moved from its original location, near the present-day intersection of Guadalupe Parkway and Taylor Street, to a location in what is now Downtown San Jose. San Jose came under Mexican rule in 1825 after Mexico broke with the Spanish crown. It then became part of the United States, after it capitulated without bloodshed in 1846 and California was annexed. Soon afterwards, on March 27, 1850, San Jose became the second incorporated city in the state (after Sacramento), with Josiah Belden its first mayor. The town was the state's first capital, as well as host of the first and second sessions (1850-1851) of the California Legislature. Today the Circle of Palms Plaza in downtown is the historical marker for the first state capital.

Though not impacted as severely as San Francisco, San Jose suffered damage from the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. Over 100 people died at the Agnews Asylum (later Agnews State Hospital) after its walls and roof collapsed, and the San Jose High School's three-story stone was also destroyed. During World War II many Japanese were sent to internment camps and, following the Los Angeles zoot suit riots, anti-Mexican violence took place in the summer of 1943.

As World War II started, the city's economy shifted from agriculture (the Del Monte cannery was the largest employer) to industrial manufacturing with the contracting of the Food Machinery Corporation (FMC) by the United States War Department to build 1000 Landing Vehicle Tracked. After World War II, FMC (later United Defense, and currently BAE Systems) continued as a defense contractor, with the San Jose facilities designing and manufacturing military platforms such as the M113 Armored Personnel Carrier, the Bradley Fighting Vehicle, and various subsystems of the M1 Abrams. IBM established its West Coast headquarters in San Jose in 1943 and opened a downtown research and development facility in 1952. Both would prove to be harbingers for the economy of San Jose, as Reynold Johnson and his team would later invent RAMAC, as well as the disc drive, and the technological side of San Jose's economy grew.

During the 1950s and 1960s, city manager Dutch Hamann led the city in a major growth campaign. The city annexed adjacent areas, such as Alviso and Cambrian Park, providing large areas for suburbs. An anti-growth reaction to the effects of rapid development emerged in the 1970s championed by mayors Norman Mineta and Janet Gray Hayes. Despite establishing an urban growth boundary, development fees, and incorporations of Campbell and Cupertino, development was not slowed, but rather directed into already incorporated areas. San Jose's position in Silicon Valley triggered more economic and population growth, which led to the highest housing costs increase in the nation, 936% between 1976 and 2001. Efforts to increase density continued into 1990s when an update of the 1974 urban plan kept the urban growth boundaries intact and voters rejected a ballot measure to ease development restrictions in the foothills. Sixty percent of the housing built in San Jose since 1980 and over three-quarters of the housing built since 2000 have been multifamily structures, reflecting a political propensity toward Smart Growth planning principles.

San Jose, like most of the Bay Area, has a Mediterranean climate. Unlike San Francisco, which is exposed to the ocean or Bay on three sides and whose temperature therefore varies relatively little year-round and overnight, San Jose lies farther inland, protected on three sides by mountains. This shelters the city from rain and makes it more of a semiarid, near-desert area, with a mean annual rainfall of 14.4 inches compared to some other parts of the Bay Area, which can get up to four times that amount. It also avoids San Francisco's omnipresent fog most of the year.

Campbell (IPA: /ˈkæmbəl/) is a city in Santa Clara County, California, part of Silicon Valley, in the San Francisco Bay Area. As of 2007 population estimates, Campbell's population is 39,200. Although not a major high-tech city like many of its neighbors, Campbell is the original home of eBay and of its creator, Pierre Omidyar.

Campbell is home to the Pruneyard Shopping Center, a sprawling open-air retail complex which was involved in a famous U.S. Supreme Court case that established the extent of the right to free speech in California. The larger of the associated Pruneyard Towers, built in 1970, was for many years the tallest building between San Francisco and Los Angeles. It is bordered on the east and north by San Jose and on the south by Los Gatos. A narrow strip of San Jose separates Campbell on the west from Saratoga. According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 5.7 miles. Of the total area, 1.75% is water, consisting of percolation ponds in Los Gatos Creek Park and in other locations; San Tomas Aquino Creek, which flows north on the west side of the city, is completely enclosed with fences and runs through concrete culverts; and Los Gatos Creek, which flows north-north-east on the east side of the city and has paths along both banks for hikers and joggers (locally called the "Par Course").

History: Campbell was founded by Benjamin Campbell, after whom the city was named. He came to California in 1846 with his father, William Campbell. William started a sawmill in Saratoga and surveyed the cities of San Jose and Santa Clara. In 1851, Benjamin bought 160 acres (0.65 km2) in southern Santa Clara Valley and cultivated hay and grain on it. This area later became Campbell's historical downtown core. About a third of Campbell was a part of the 1839 Alta California Rancho Rinconada de Los Gatos land grant. The Northern extent of the granted land was along present-day Rincon Avenue and across the North end of John D. Morgan Park in central Campbell. In 1878, Campbell sold his land for $5 an acre to a railroad company. By 1887, the first subdivision was recorded west of the railroad from Campbell Avenue to the spot where the Water Tower Plaza now stands. The area became the center for shipping fruit grown in the surrounding area, and within a short time, the drying grounds and canneries made Campbell an important rail center. The Campbell Fruit Growers' Union became a well-known cooperative with its 17-acre drying yard. J.C. Ainsley Packing Company, Hyde Cannery, and Payne Cannery were the main fruit packing companies. The Bank of Campbell was founded in 1895.

Campbell was officially incorporated as a city in 1952. The city then grew rapidly as orchard lands disappeared tract by tract. Today, Campbell is a suburban residential neighborhood in the southern part of the Santa Clara Valley. 

Los Gatos is an incorporated town in Santa Clara County, California. The population was 28,592 at the 2000 census. It is located in the San Francisco Bay Area, on the edge of Silicon Valley on the southwest corner of San Jose in the foothills of the Santa Cruz Mountains. Homes are mostly upscale, varying from one million-dollar cottages in the village itself to 7- or 8-million-dollar large custom homes in the surrounding hills. The town is noted for its small but upscale downtown, with many chic shops and restaurants. It is also a preferred destination for antique shopping.

The name Los Gatos is Spanish, meaning the cats. The name derives from the 1839 Alta California land-grant that encompassed the area, which was called Rancho Rinconada de Los Gatos, ("the corner of the cats"), where "the cats" refers to the wild cats (bobcats and mountain lions) that are indigenous to the Santa Cruz Mountains in whose foothills the town is nestled. The name has been anglicized to las gaddis or "liss gaddis", although one also hears pronunciations truer to the original Spanish, lohs GAH tos.

The founding of the town dates to the mid-1850s with the building of Forbes Mill by James Alexander Forbes along Los Gatos Creek. The townsite that was established in the 1860s was originally named for the mill, but the name was changed to Los Gatos after the Spanish land grant. The town was incorporated in 1887 and remained an important town for the logging industry in the Santa Cruz Mountains through the end of the 19th century. In the early 20th century the town became a thriving agricultural town with apricots, grapes and prunes being grown in the area. Along with much of the Santa Clara Valley, Los Gatos became a suburban community for San Jose beginning in the 1950s, and the town was mostly built-out by the 1980s.

Downtown Los Gatos has retained and restored many of its Victorian-era homes and commercial buildings. Other notable buildings are the Forbes Mill annex, dating to 1880 and now housing a history museum, Los Gatos High School which dates from the 1920s, and the Old Town Shopping Center, formerly the University Avenue School (the school was established in 1882; the current buildings date to 1923).

Monte Sereno (from Spanish monte, hill, and sereno, serene) is a city in Santa Clara County, California. The population was 3,483 at the 2000 census. The city is located in the foothills of the Santa Cruz Mountains, about 10 miles southwest of San Jose and is immediately northwest of Los Gatos. The city is named for 2249 ft. El Sereno mountain upon whose slopes the southern portion of the city is built. The community is entirely residential, with no commercial zoning and 99% single-family housing, and is an upscale Silicon Valley bedroom community. Monte Sereno shares the 95030 ZIP code with the Town of Los Gatos. Many municipal services are provided under contract by the city of Los Gatos.

The Monte Sereno area was part of the 1839 Alta California land grant of Rancho Rinconada de Los Gatos. The city incorporated on May 14, 1957 to protect its semi-rural atmosphere. John Steinbeck wrote The Grapes of Wrath and Of Mice and Men in a wooded home at 16250 Greenwood Lane in what is now Monte Sereno.

According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 1.62 square miles, all of it land. Saratoga-Los Gatos Road (State Route 9) runs through the city.

Saratoga is a city in Santa Clara County, California. It is located on the west side of the Santa Clara Valley, directly west of San Jose, in the San Francisco Bay Area. The population was 30,318 at the 2007 census.
Located in the heart of Silicon Valley, Saratoga is locally known for its rural small-town feel, wineries, and high-end boutiques. In 2008, CNN/Money ranked Saratoga number four in its listing of top-earning towns. Saratoga was also ranked by Forbes in 2009 as one of America's top 20 most educated small towns. Major attractions include Villa Montalvo, Hakone Gardens, and the Mountain Winery.

History: The first European settlement of what is now Saratoga occurred in 1848, when William Campbell (father of Benjamin Campbell, the founder of nearby Campbell, California) constructed a sawmill about 2.5 miles (4.0 km) southeast of the present downtown area. An early map noted the area as Campbell's Gap. In 1851, Martin McCarty, who had leased the mill, built a toll road down to the Santa Clara Valley. The toll gate was located at the present day intersection of Big Basin Way and 3rd St., giving the town its first widely used name: Toll Gate. In 1855 the town received a post office under the name of McCartysville. Industry soon sprang up: at its height the town had a furniture factory, grist mill, tannery, and a paper factory. To commemorate this newfound productivity, the town was renamed yet again in 1863, this time as Bank Mills. Shortly after this, however, a spring was discovered which had a mineral content similar to the springs at Saratoga Springs, New York. In 1865, the town received its final name, Saratoga. At the same time, a resort hotel was constructed at the springs, and it attracted tourists to the area until it burned down in 1903.

Saratoga then became quietly agricultural, along with much of the rest of the valley. A few vineyards and orchards from this period remain today. After World War II, the town quickly became urbanized, and it incorporated in 1956, mostly to avoid being annexed to San Jose. A slogan during the campaign to incorporate the city of Saratoga was "Keep it rural," according to historian Willys I. Peck. Today the city serves as a bedroom community for upper-middle class Silicon Valley tech workers.

According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 12.1 square miles (31.4 km²), all of it land. Within its borders, Saratoga includes lush redwood forests, foothills suitable for wine grapes and sunny valley floor once covered with prune and apricot orchards, now with suburban homes, schools and churches.

Cupertino is a suburban city in Santa Clara County, California, directly west of San Jose on the western edge of the Santa Clara Valley with portions extending into the foothills of the Santa Cruz Mountains. The population was 50,546 at the time of the 2000 census. The town has given its name to the Cupertino effect.

Cupertino in the 1800s was a small rural village at the crossroads of Stevens Creek Road and Saratoga-Mountain View Road (later Saratoga-Sunnyvale Road, and then renamed to De Anza Boulevard within Cupertino city limits). Back then, it was known as the West Side and was part of Fremont Township. The primary economic activity was fruit agriculture. Almost all of the land within Cupertino's present-day boundaries were covered by prune, plum, apricot, and cherry orchards. A winery on Montebello Ridge overlooking the Cupertino valley region was also operating by the late 1800s.

Soon railroads, electric railways, and dirt roads traversed the West Side farmlands. Monta Vista, Cupertino's first housing tract, was developed in the mid-1900s as a result of the electric railway's construction. After World War II, a population and suburban housing boom dramatically shifted the demographics and economy of the Santa Clara Valley, as the "Valley of Heart's Delight" was beginning to transform into "Silicon Valley". In 1954, Cupertino leaders began to drive for incorporation as they were concerned about unplanned development and rising property taxes. In the September 27, 1955 election, voters approved the incorporation of the City of Cupertino. Cupertino officially became Santa Clara County's 13th City on October 10, 1955.

A major milestone in Cupertino's development was the creation by some of the city's largest landowners of VALLCO Business and Industrial Park in the early 1960s. Of the 25 property owners, 17 decided to pool their land to form VALLCO Park, 6 sold to Varian Associates (property later sold to Hewlett-Packard), and two opted for transplanting to farms elsewhere. The name VALLCO was derived from the names of the principal developers: Varian Associates and the Leonard, Lester, Craft, and Orlando families. A neighborhood shopping center and, much later, Vallco Fashion Park (now Cupertino Square) were also developed. Other notable businesses headquartered in Cupertino include Apple and Symantec Corporation. De Anza College opened in 1967. The college, named for Juan Bautista De Anza, occupies a 112-acre site that was the location of a winery built at the turn of the last century, called Beaulieu by its owners, Charles and Ella Baldwin. Their mansion has now become the California History Center. De Anza College now has about 22,000 students and is a hub of activity in the city.

Housing developments were rapidly constructed in the following years as developers created many neighborhoods, including Fairgrove, Garden Gate, Monta Vista, Seven Springs, and many other developments. Although originally low-cost housing, Silicon Valley's housing prices shot up dramatically as many houses that were formerly lowly priced became multi-million dollar homes. The high cost of living in Cupertino is attributed by people wanting their children to receive high quality schooling. Nevertheless, the price of the house seems to weather even during the 2007-8 slump in economy. Eichler homes are popular and even sought after in Rancho Rinconada Fairgrove neighborhood.

Santa Clara, California (IPA: /ˌsæntəˈklærə/), founded in 1777 and incorporated in 1852, is a city in Santa Clara County, in the U.S. state of California. The city is the site of the eighth of 21 California missions, Mission Santa Clara de Asís, and was named after the mission. The Mission and Mission Gardens are located on the grounds of Santa Clara University.

Santa Clara is located in the center of Silicon Valley, and is home to the headquarters of Intel, Applied Materials, Sun Microsystems, NVIDIA, Agilent Technologies, and many other high-tech companies. It is home to both Mission College and Santa Clara University, the latter being the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of California. Santa Clara is also home to Great America, an amusement park operated by Cedar Fair, L.P. The San Francisco 49ers NFL football team has its heaquarters and practice facilities in Santa Clara. On Wednesday, November 8, 2006, the 49ers announced their intention to move the team to Santa Clara, after negotiations failed with the city of San Francisco to build a new stadium.

Santa Clara owns and operates an electric utility called Silicon Valley Power. In 2005 Silicon Valley Power brought online the Donald Von Raesfeld (DVR) Power Plant. The new combined-cycle gas turbine plant produces 147 megawatts of electricity for the city and its residents. As a result, the going rate for electricity in Santa Clara is considerably cheaper than that offered by Northern California's dominant utility, Pacific Gas and Electric.

Santa Clara is drained by three seasonal creeks, all of which empty into the southern portion of San Francisco Bay; these creeks are San Tomas Aquino Creek, Saratoga Creek, and Calabazas Creek. There are some significant biological resources within the city including habitat for the burrowing owl, a species of special concern in California due to reduction in habitat from urban development during the latter 20th century. This owl uses burrows created by ground squirrels and prefers generally level grasslands and even disturbed areas.

Sunnyvale is a city in Santa Clara County, California. It is one of the major cities that make up the Silicon Valley. As of the 2000 census, the city population was 131,760. The city is bordered by the San Francisco Bay and San Jose to the north, Moffett Federal Airfield to the northwest, Mountain View to the west, Los Altos to the southwest, Cupertino to the south, and Santa Clara to the east. It lies along the historic El Camino Real and Highway 101.

As part of the Silicon Valley, Sunnyvale is headquarters to several high-tech companies such as Maxim Integrated Products, Juniper Networks, Palm, Inc., AMD, NetApp, Spansion, Yahoo!, Mirapoint, and Ariba. Sunnyvale is also home to several aerospace/defense companies; Lockheed Martin has a major facility in Sunnyvale, and Honeywell, Northrop Grumman Electronic Systems - Marine Systems (location of the Hendy Iron Works Museum), and Spirent Communications also have offices in Sunnyvale. Sunnyvale is also the home to Onizuka Air Force Station, where its main building, locally known as the Blue Cube, is its most prominent feature. The base, named for the deceased Space Shuttle Challenger astronaut Ellison Onizuka, is the primary artificial satellite control facility of the United States armed forces.

Sunnyvale is one of the few U.S. cities to have a single unified Department of Public Safety, where all personnel are trained as firefighters, police officers, and EMTs, so they can respond to an emergency in any of the three roles.

Mountain View is a city in Santa Clara County, California. The city gets its name from the views of the Santa Cruz Mountains. As of the 2000 census, the city had a total population of 70,708.

History: After the former rancho of Don Mariano Castro was split, the south eventually became the city of Sunnyvale, and the north became Mountain View. The town began as a stage stop on the route between San Francisco and San Jose (corresponding to El Camino Real), close to present-day Grant Road. With the coming of the railroad, the center of town eventually moved to its current location at Castro Street. Much of Mountain View was agricultural through the 1940s, 1950s, and most of the 1960s. Row crops and orchards were common during this era, when there was still open space between Palo Alto and Mountain View. In Bittersweet: Memories of Old Mountain View, an Oral History, residents of Japanese ancestry recall their family's strawberry fields adjoining Moffett Field. Orchards lined much of Grant Road and Miramonte. In the early 1900s, grapes were a common crop in the area of present-day Continental Circle. Phylloxera ended grape production in Mountain View in the early 1900s. During the Cold War, the drone of Navy P-3 turboprop aircraft was a constant presence, Moffett Field being the home of squadrons of them and their almost constant touch-and-go training flights. The horns of railroad locomotives were also frequently heard. The El Camino Hospital District, a government entity called a Special District under the California Government Code, came to life in the 1960s. The hospital facility at 2500 Grant Road has been in continual operation since.

Nearly anyone using the term Silicon Valley would include Mountain View in that region. An early Silicon Valley company was Fairchild Camera and Instrument Company, located along Whisman Road. Several of Intel's founders came from Fairchild. Local watering holes for workers included Chubby's Broiler (which once stood at Ellis and Fairchild near Hwy 101, but which moved in 1999 to near Tasman and Lawrence Expressway in Sunnyvale) and Walker's Wagon Wheel on Middlefield Road near Whisman (since torn down). Folklore was that semiconductor pioneers were collaborative and met at the Wagon Wheel to discuss problems they were having with production. 

Palo Alto is a California charter city located in the northwest corner of Santa Clara County, in the San Francisco Bay Area of California. It is named after a tree called El Palo Alto. The city includes portions of Stanford University and is headquarters to a number of Silicon Valley high-technology companies, including Hewlett-Packard and Facebook. As of the 2000 census, the city had a total population of 58,598 residents.

HISTORY: Earliest recorded history stems from 1769, when Gaspar de Portolá noted an Ohlone settlement. This remains an area of known Indian mounds. A plaque is erected at Middlefield Road and Embarcadero Road to commemorate this area. The city got its name from a tall tree, El Palo Alto, by the banks of the San Francisquito Creek bordering Menlo Park. You can still find half of this tree (the other half was destroyed when the creek flooded) along the foot bridge on Alma Street. A plaque recounts the story of a 63 man, 200 horse expedition from San Diego to the mission at Monterey from November 7–11, 1769. The group overshot and reached the bay instead. Regarding the bay as too wide to cross, the group decided to turn around near 'el palo alto.'

About 1827 Rafael Soto, tenth child and son of De Anza Expedition settler Ignacio Soto and María Bárbara Espinosa de Lugo of Alta California came to stay with Maximo Martinez at his great Rancho el corte de Madera for seven years. It was 13,316 acres (53.89 km2). Located south of the San Francisquito Creek, west of today's I-280, it covered most of Portola Valley to Skyline Boulevard extending south to about Foothill College. Rafael and family settled in 1835 near the San Francisquito Creek near Newell & Middlefield. Selling goods to travelers in the area about 1830. His property, Rancho Rinconada del Arroyo de San Francisquito was granted in 1835 at a size of about 2,230 acres (9 km2) and reduced over time and claim. His wife, Maria Antnio Mesa, met with problems maintaining ownership. Their daughter María Luisa married John Coppinger in 1839 who owned a large area west of the same creek, Rancho Canada de Raimundo. It began at Almbique Creek, the north border of el Corte de Madera, and extended north for 12,545 acres. Now part of Woodside, Bear Gulch Creek / Bear Creek flowed on his land in Portola Valley and present San Mateo County. It also abutted Buelna's grant near Skyline Boulevard and Matadero Creek. Upon his death, Maria inherited it and married later a visiting boat captain, John Greer, who stumbled into the area. He owned a home on the property that is now Town & Country Village on Embarcadero & El Camino Real. Greer Avenue and Court are named for him.

To the west of Rafael Soto near El Camino and following the Creek was the next grantee in 1839, Antonio Buelna and wife Dona Maria Concepcion. To the south of the Sotos was another family, cousins and later grantee owners; the Robles brothers. Espanolos, Castilian, they said, and named Don Secundino and Teodoro. The older born in 1813 at Presidio Branciforte (Santa Cruz). Sons of a Mexiacan Army Californio. In 1849 they bought their 8,500 acres property from José Peña, his 1841 grantee of Rancho Santa Rita, named Rancho Rincon de Francisquito. It was basically from San Francisquito Creek, Alpine Road and Bishop Ln. (behind Stanford Shopping Ctr.) & golf course. Then South along the Santa Cruz Foothills between Junipero Serra & Hwy 280 to the (Intersection of Matadoro Creek/ Hillview /Miranda) & then SW near the intersection of Page Mill & Arastradero Rd. where the Jone's House was), then east down Arastradero Rd. to the north property line of Alta Mesa Memorial Park and Terman Park. Follow the trail of what was once the old stage road over Adobe Creek/Yuegas Creek to El Camino Real & then east on San Abtonio Rd. to the Bay marshes passing over the RR and what was once the Jeffry's House & Stables.The property then went along the bay to the Embarcadero, a major boundary in the day. Then up to the Stanford University gates, up Galvez and along Campus way to the hills near the golf course. That's the Robles Rancho, about 80% of Palo Alto and Stanford University. So why aren't they historically famous? It was Spanish California! It was whittled down by 1863 through courts to 6,981 acres. Stories say their grand hacienda was built on the former meager adobe of José Peña near Ferne off San Antonio Road, midway between Middlefield and Alma St.. These 2 boys did well. Read their story and understand how they earned money to buy this land in 1847. They later were forced to sell 250 acres in 1853 the present Barron Park, Matadero Creek and Stanford Business Park to Elisha Oscar Crosby ~ Creator of the term 'Mayfield'. Their hacienda hosted fiestas and bull fights. It was ruined in the 1906 earthquake and its lumber was used to build a large barn nearby which it is said lingered until the early 1950s. In 1880 Secundino Robles, father to twenty-nine children, still lived near present day Sears Dept. Store and was bounded on the south by Mariano Castro's grant across the street on San Antonio Road.
From 1846–1848, the United States and Mexico were at war, which concluded with U.S. acquisition of California and New Mexico. Mexican land grants became targets of the Americans settlers and tycoons. They were much more passive and had no real ability to confront De Anza and his men. Palo Alto was destined to be an early settlement but was reconsidered due to low creek levels. They marched on and set up a camp (Presidio) in present day San Francisco.

Many of the Spanish names in the Palo Alto area represent the local heritage and descriptive terms and former residents. Pena Court, Miranda Avenue, which was essentially Foothill Expwy was the married name of Juana Briones and the name occurs in Courts and Avenues others in Palo Alto to Mountain View in the quadrant where she owned vast areas between Stanford Univ., Grant Road in Mountain View and west of El Camino. Yerba Buena was to her credit. Rinconada was the major Mexican land grant name.

The township of Mayfield was formed in 1855, in what is now part of South Palo Alto. In 1886, Leland Stanford came to the town of Mayfield, interested in founding his university there, and creating a train stop near his school on Mayfield's downtown street, Lincoln Street (now named California Avenue). However, he had one condition: alcohol had to be banned from the town. Known for its 13 rowdy saloons, Mayfield rejected his requests for reform. This led him to drive the formation of Palo Alto, originally called University Park, in 1887 with the help of his friend Timothy Hopkins of the Southern Pacific Railroad who bought 740 acres of private land for the new townsite. Stanford set up his university, Stanford University, and a train stop (on University Avenue) by his new town. With Stanford’s support, saloon days faded and Palo Alto grew to the size of Mayfield. On July 2, 1925, Palo Alto voters approved the annexation of Mayfield and the two communities were officially consolidated on July 6, 1925. This saga explains why Palo Alto has two downtown areas: one along University Avenue and one along California Avenue. The Mayfield News wrote its own obituary four days later:
It is with a feeling of deep regret that we see on our streets today those who would sell, or give, our beautiful little city to an outside community. We have watched Mayfield grow from a small hamlet, when Palo Alto was nothing more than a hayfield, to her present size … and it is with a feeling of sorrow that we contemplate the fact that there are those who would sell or give the city away.

Many of Stanford University’s first faculty members settled in the Professorville neighborhood of Palo Alto. Professorville, now a registered national historic district, is bounded by Kingsley, Lincoln, and Addison avenues and the cross streets of Ramona, Bryant, and Waverley. The district includes a large number of well preserved residences dating from the 1890s including 833 Kingsley, 345 Lincoln and 450 Kingsley. 1044 Bryant was the home of Russell Varian, co-inventor of the Klystron tube. The Lee DeForest laboratory site, situated at 218 Channing, is a California Historical Landmark recognizing DeForest's 1911 invention of the vacuum tube and electronic oscillator at that location. While not open to the public, the garage that housed the launch of Hewlett Packard is located at 367 Addison Av. Hewlett Packard recently restored the house and garage. A second historic district on Ramona Street can be found downtown between University and Hamilton Avenues.

Morgan Hill is a city located in the southern part of Santa Clara County, California. Founded on November 10, 1906, the city was named after Hiram Morgan Hill, a San Franciscan who built a country retreat home there in 1884. Originally a community of ranchers, farmers and orchardists, the city has evolved into a bedroom community for the high-tech industries in Silicon Valley. As of the United States 2000 Census, the city had a population of 33,556. The silhouette of El Toro, a distinctive hill overshadowing the town to the west, has been incorporated into the city's seal and official logo.

Morgan Hill is the only known site where one can find the semi-precious stone Poppy Jasper, a form of Jasper known as Orbicular or Picture Jasper. It is believed that the deposits of Poppy Jasper were formed due to the unique combination of volcanic/seismic activity in the El Toro mountain area of what is now Morgan Hill. The El Toro Brewing Co. has a collection of Poppy Jasper on display at their brewery in rural Morgan Hill and a large bar inlaid with the stone at their brewpub in downtown Morgan Hill. Examples are also on display at the Morgan Hill Museum.

Gilroy is the southernmost city in Santa Clara County, California. According to the United States 2000 Census, the city population was 41,464. The California Department of Finance estimates that the population had grown to 51,173 as of January 1, 2008, making it the 173rd largest city in the state. Gilroy is well known for its garlic crop; the Gilroy Garlic Festival which occurs annually, featuring various garlicky foods including garlic ice cream. Gilroy also produces mushrooms in considerable quantity. Gilroy's nickname is "Garlic Capital of the World," although Gilroy does not lead the world in garlic production. While garlic is grown in Gilroy, its nickname comes from the fact that Gilroy Foods processes more garlic than any other factory in the world; most pickled, minced, and powdered garlic come from Gilroy.

Approximately eight miles northeast of Gilroy, via Gilroy Hot Springs Road, lies the famous Victorian resort Gilroy Yamato Hot Springs, a California Historical Landmark. Gilroy also is home to the Gilroy Premium Outlets, a large shopping center consisting entirely of outlet stores. Long-time local landmarks include Gilroy Gardens Family Theme Park, formerly Treehaven, Hecker Pass...A Family Adventure, (a venue for corporate picnics and birthday parties). The park is located along SR152 west of town. Past Gilroy Gardens on SR152 about 12 driving miles west of town is Mount Madonna County Park. Another large presence is the Gilroy Foods plant. Cattle, garlic, and strawberries, occupy acres toward Hollister and San Martin.