Rancho Rincon de San Francisquito

The Rancho Rincon de San Francisquito was once a massive land grant covering much of what is now southern Palo Alto and parts of the Stanford University campus. In eighteen forty-one, the Mexican governor Juan Alvarado granted this eight thousand four hundred eighteen-acre tract to José Peña, a former artilleryman at the Presidio of San Francisco. The name itself refers to a bend or corner of the San Francisquito Creek, which formed a natural boundary for the property.