VIII The Santa Clara Valley
Santa Clara. When the Spaniards passed through this valley, they were not slow to recognize in it one of those favored spots on the earth’s surface where climate and soil unite to produce the highest results. So here they founded two missions, one at Santa Clara, and one at San José.
Santa Clara (St. Clara), stands in one of the most fertile valleys in California, which is equivalent to saying in the whole world, and is about forty-six miles south-southeast of San Francisco. The mission was founded by Padres Peña and Murguia, January 12, 1777. The buildings now standing are mainly modern, but a small portion of the original structure being incorporated in them. The ceiling over the sanctuary is original, and a small part of the adobe buildings.
Clara de Asís, the sweet saint for whom this mission was named, was the daughter of a nobleman. Her beauty and wealth brought her many offers of marriage, all of which she refused, preferring to devote herself to a religious life. She became the founder of the order of Franciscan nuns, known as the “Poor Clares,” to which many noble ladies attached themselves. The rules of the order were so strict that St. Clara’s health finally became under-mined, and she died in an ecstatic trance, believing herself called to Heaven by angelic voices. Her special symbol is the lily, peculiarly appropriate for the patroness of the ever-blooming Santa Clara Valley.
San José
San José (St. Joseph), enjoys the distinction of having been the first white colony planted in the state by the Spaniards, although when we read the complaints of the padres concerning the highly undesirable character of its first settlers, recruited mainly from the criminal classes of Sonora, the distinction would seem to be of rather a doubtful sort.
Spurred on by the old bogie of their fear of foreign invasion, the Spanish government decided to establish colonies of white settlers, believing that their hold upon the country would be rendered more secure by this means. The pueblo of San José de Guadalupe, founded November 29, 1777, by Lieutenant José Moraga, then in command at San Francisco, under orders from Governor Neve, was originally located on a site about a mile and a quarter distant from the present city, but was removed in 1797, in consequence of the discovery that the low-lying ground of its first location was often submerged during the winter rains. The people of the pueblo were compelled to travel a distance of three miles to attend mass at the Santa Clara Mission, and in order to make this journey more agreeable, Father Maguín de Catala laid out the alameda between the two places, planting a fine avenue of willow trees which once comforted the wayfarer with their grateful shade. The original trees have now practically all disappeared and others have taken their places in part. The old alameda has vanished.
Not until 1797 was the mission of San José founded, on a spot some fourteen miles distant from the pueblo. The padres had no keen desire to place the missions in close proximity to the pueblos, fearing the evil influence on the Indians of a bad class of white men, besides other inevitable complications, such as the mixing up of cattle. Father Engelhardt, in his History of the California Missions, tells the story of the founding of the Mission San José thus: “Here, on Trinity Sunday, June 11, 1797, Father Lasuén raised and blessed the cross. In a shelter of boughs he celebrated Holy Mass, and thus dedicated the mission in honor of the foster-father of Christ, St. Joseph.”
The old church was unfortunately so shattered by an earthquake in 1868 that it was torn down and replaced by a wooden edifice.
It should be made clear that two missions were established here, Santa Clara and San José, and that the latter was not at San José, as some maps represent it, but some fourteen miles distant from the town.
Palo Alto
Palo Alto (high stick, or tree), in Santa Clara County, sixteen miles northwest of San José, once a stock farm where blooded horses were raised, now best known as the site of the Leland Stanford Junior University, is said to have received its name from a tall redwood tree on the San Francisquito (little St. Francis) creek. This tree stands just a few feet from the railroad bridge near Palo Alto station, and is said by old residents to have originally been in the form of a twin tree, one of the twins having been cut down. The trees of this species received the name Palo Colorado (red stick, or tree), from the Portolá party, whose attention was attracted by their uncommon size and the peculiar reddish color of the wood, and the honor of their discovery may justly be awarded to Gaspar de Portolá, since he seems to have been the first white man to make report of having seen them.
This place was named by the Anza expedition of 1775-1776, and it seems rather strange that no mention is made in the diaries of the fact that the tree was a twin. Father Pedro Font, who accompanied the expedition, says: “From a slight eminence I here observed the lay of the port from this point and saw that its extremity lay to the east-southeast. I also noticed that a very high spruce tree, which is to be seen at a great distance, rising up like a great tower, from the Llano de los Robles,—it stands on the banks of the Arroyo de San Francisco, later on I measured its height—lay to the southeast.” Further on in the diary he says: “Beside this stream is the redwood tree I spoke of yesterday: I measured its height with the graphometer which they lent me at the mission of San Carlos, and, according to my reckoning, found it to be some fifty yards high, more or less; the trunk was five yards and a half in circumference at the base, and the soldiers said that there were still larger ones in the mountains.”—(Translation edited by Frederick J. Teggart.) This description of Father Font’s gives rise to a strong suspicion that the tree now so highly venerated is not the original Palo Alto from which the place takes its name. The name was first applied to a land grant.
La Salud
La Salud (health). In the name of this place, not far from the San Lorenzo River, reached by the Portolá party on October 22, there is a reference to one of the heaviest of the afflictions from which the Spaniards suffered during their journey up the state,—serious sickness and many deaths from scurvy. To their great surprise, after a wetting received during a heavy storm at this place, all the sick began to recover. Costansó, in his diary, date of October 22, says: “The day dawned overcast and gloomy. The men were wet. What excited our wonder was that all the sick, for whom we greatly feared that the wetting might prove harmful, suddenly found their pains very much relieved. This was the reason for giving the canyon the name of La Salud.”—(Translation edited by Frederick J. Teggart.)
Los Gatos
Los Gatos (the cats), is the rather unpoetic name of a very pretty town in Santa Clara County, ten miles southwest of San José. From its location at the mouth of a canyon in the Santa Cruz Mountains, the inference may be drawn that it was named in reference to the wild-cats which even at this day infest that region. John Charles Fremont, in his Memoirs, says: “The valley is openly wooded with groves of oak, free from under-brush, and after the spring rains covered with grass. On the west it is protected from the chilling influence of the northwest winds by the Cuesta de los Gatos (wild-cat ridge), which separates it from the coast.”
“It seems to have been known as early as 1831 as La Cuesta de los Gatos. That there were troublous times about there in other matters besides wild-cats is evidenced by the story of a lively fight that took place in 1831 against a band of Indians under a chief named Yoscol. This chief was eventually captured by the Santa Clara authorities and beheaded, his head being exposed in front of the mission as a warning to others.”—(W. Drummond Norie, of Los Gatos.)
Supplementary List
Almadén (mine, mineral), a word of Moorish origin. New Álmadén, in Santa Clara County, where there is a quicksilver mine, is named after the famous Almadén quicksilver mines of Spain.
Alviso (a surname). Alviso is in Santa Clara County, eight miles northwest of San José, and received its name from Ignacio Alviso, a native of Sonora, born in 1772, who was a member of Anza’s party of colonists in 1775-6. He was the original Alviso of California, and was the grantee of Rincón de los Esteros Rancho.
Arroyo Hondo (deep creek).
Coyote, the native wolf of California. Coyote is an Aztec word, originally coyotl. The town of this name is situated thirteen miles southeast of San José.
Las Llagas (the wounds or stigmata of St. Francis),—in reference to the legend that St. Francis was supposed to have received, after a fast of fifty days, the miraculous imprint of the wounds of the Savior in his hands, feet and side. Las Llagas was the name of a place near Gilroy, and was also given by the padres to Alameda Creek.
Madroño, often misspelled madrone, is the name given by the Spaniards to a very beautiful tree indigenous to California, which is thus described by Fremont in his Memoirs: “Another remarkable tree of these woods is called in the language of the country Madroña. It is a beautiful evergreen, with large, thick and glossy digitated leaves; the trunk and branches reddish-colored, and having a smooth and singularly naked appearance, as if the bark had been stripped off. In its green state the wood is brittle, very heavy, hard and close-grained; it is said to assume a red color when dry, sometimes variegated, and susceptible of a high polish. Some measured nearly four feet in diameter, and were about sixty feet high.”
Milpitas, see page 232.
San Felipe (St. Philip), is the name of a village in Santa Clara County. There were four saints of this name, perhaps the most distinguished being St. Philip Neri, a Florentine, born in 1515. He was the intimate friend of St. Charles Borroméo, patron of the mission at Monterey, and was the founder of the order of the Oratorians, “who were bound by no vows, and were not secluded from the world, but went about reading and praying with the sick and needy, founding and visiting hospitals and doing various charities.” Then there was St. Philip of Bethsaida, who, going to Hieropolis, “found the people worshipping a huge serpent, or dragon, which they thought to be a personification of Mars. Then Philip took pity on their ignorance. He held up the cross and commanded the serpent to disappear. Immediately it glided from beneath the altar, and as it moved it sent forth so dreadful an odor that many died, and among them the son of the King; but Philip restored him to life. Then the priests of the serpent were so wroth with the apostle that they crucified him, and when he was fastened to the cross they stoned him.”—(Stories of the Saints.)
San Martín (St. Martin), is a town in Santa Clara County, six miles north of Gilroy. St. Martin has many legends connected with his history. Before he became a Christian, he was a soldier and was noted for his kindness and charity to his comrades. “The winter of 332 was so severely cold that large numbers perished in the streets of Amiens, where the regiment of St. Martin was quartered. One day he met at the gate a naked man, and taking pity on him, he divided his cloak, for it was all he had, and gave half to the beggar. That night in a dream Jesus stood before him, and on his shoulders he wore the half of the cloak that Martin had given the beggar. And he said to the angels who attended him, ‘Know ye who hath thus arrayed me? My servant Martin, though yet unbaptized, hath done this.’ Then Martin was immediately baptized.” Again it is told of him that being invited to sup with the emperor, “the cup was passed to Martin, before his Majesty drank, with the expectation that he would touch it to his lips, as was the custom. But a poor priest stood behind Martin, and to the surprise and admiration of all, the saint presented the full goblet to him, thus signifying that a servant of God deserved more honor, however humble his station, than any merely earthly potentate; from this legend he has been chosen the patron of all innocent conviviality.”—(Stories of the Saints.)