Rancho Ulistac

Rancho Ulistac was a 2,217-acre (8.97 km2) Mexican land grant in present-day Santa Clara County, California given in 1845 by Governor Pío Pico to Marcello and Cristobal, Indians.[1] The grant extended across lowlands reaching from the Alviso shoreline southward and encompassing the land between the Guadalupe River and Saratoga Creek, and the town of Agnew.[2][3][4]

History

In 1846, Governor Pico granted one-half square league to Santa Clara Mission indians Marcello and his companion Cristobal.

Jacob David Hoppe (1813-1853), was born in Maryland and came to California in 1846. He established a newspaper, which later became the "Alta California". He was elected a delegate to the 1849 California Constitutional Convention. After the discovery of gold, he went to the mines, where he remained a few months with some profit, and returned to San Jose, where he became the first American Postmaster.[5] Hoppe acquired Rancho Ulistac from the original Indian grantees.[6] Hoppe was killed in the explosion of the SS Jenny Lind en route from Alviso to San Francisco on April 11, 1853.

With the cession of California to the United States following the Mexican-American War, the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo provided that the land grants would be honored. As required by the Land Act of 1851, a claim for Rancho Ulistac was filed with the Public Land Commission in 1852,[7] and the grant was patented to heirs of Jacob D. Hoppe in 1868.[8]

The Hoppe heirs sold the land in 1860. In 1885, 1,650 acres (6.7 km2) of Rancho Ulistac were developed as a site of the Agnew state hospital for the insane. The hospital was destroyed in the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, leaving 125 dead, but was quickly rebuilt.

The name "Ulistac" derives from the language of the Ohlone people who once inhabited the area. Uli is believed to be the name of an Ohlone chief, and the suffix -tac means "place", so that "Ulistac" likely meant "Uli's place".[9] However, other sources define it to mean "at Ulis".[9] In 1916, linguist A. L. Kroeber wrote that, while -tac is a Tamyen suffix meaning "place of", the rest of the name is unidentifiable.[10]

Historic sites of the Rancho

References

  1. ↑ Ogden Hoffman, 1862, Reports of Land Cases Determined in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California, Numa Hubert, San Francisco
  2. ↑ Diseño del Rancho Ulistac
  3. ↑ U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Rancho Ulistac
  4. ↑ Early Santa Clara Ranchos, Grants, Patents and Maps
  5. ↑ Frederic Hall, 1871, The history of San José and surroundings
  6. ↑ Hoover, Mildred B.; Rensch, Hero; Rensch, Ethel; Abeloe, William N. (1966). Historic Spots in California. Stanford University Press. ISBN 978-0-8047-4482-9.
  7. ↑ United States. District Court (California : Northern District) Land Case 323 ND
  8. ↑ Report of the Surveyor General 1844 - 1886
  9. 1 2 "Ohlone History". Ulistac Natural Area Restoration and Education Project. November 11, 2013. Retrieved February 22, 2016.
  10. ↑ Schuk, Carolyn (October 30, 2013). "Pre-Spanish San Francisco Bay Cultures Anything But Primitive". Santa Clara Weekly (44). Retrieved February 23, 2016.

Coordinates: 37°24′00″N 121°58′12″W / 37.40°N 121.970°W / 37.40; -121.970

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