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Santa Teresa, San Jose facts for kids

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Santa Teresa
Neighborhood of San Jose
Ramac Park, Santa Teresa (cropped).jpg
Shops on Village Oaks Dr in Santa Teresa, San Jose 1753.jpg
Santa Palmia in Santa Teresa, South San Jose 1811.jpg
Ascent Apartments Sunset (39420347191) (cropped).jpg
Apartments on Vía del Oro 2217.jpg
Top: Ramac Park; middle: shops on Village Oaks Dr; apartments on Palmia Ave; bottom: view of the Santa Teresa Hills from Ascent Apartments; apartments on Vía del Oro.
Santa Teresa is located in San Jose, California
Santa Teresa
Santa Teresa
Location in San Jose, California
Country United States
State California
County Santa Clara
City San Jose

Santa Teresa is a neighborhood in San Jose, California, located in the southern part of the city. It was started in 1834 as Rancho Santa Teresa by the Bernal family. Today, Santa Teresa is mostly a place where people live. It is also home to many big tech companies from Silicon Valley.

This area is the southernmost urban part of San Jose. To its south is the protected Coyote Valley. The Santa Teresa Hills are to its west, and the Bayshore Freeway (Highway 101) is to its east.

Discovering Santa Teresa's Past

Don Bruno Bernal (Rancho Santa Teresa en S. Jose, California)
Don Bruno Bernal managed Rancho Santa Teresa from 1837 to 1863.

Santa Teresa began in 1834 as Rancho Santa Teresa. This was a special land grant given by Governor José Figueroa to Don José Joaquín Bernal. He was a retired soldier who came to California in 1776. José Joaquín Bernal had already been living in the area since 1826.

He named the area Santa Teresa because he believed the healing waters of the Santa Teresa Spring were a gift from Saint Teresa of Ávila. She was a Spanish saint from the 1500s. Rancho Santa Teresa quickly became a lively place for Californio families in the southern Santa Clara Valley. They often had fiestas with Fandango dancing and big feasts.

After Don José Joaquín passed away, his son, Don Bruno Bernal, took over the rancho. His other two brothers, Agustín and Juan Pablo, started businesses outside of Santa Teresa. During the California Gold Rush, Agustín and Juan Pablo sold their cattle to miners. Don Bruno stayed home and managed the rancho.

Don Bruno became a very important person in the region. He ran the rancho until he died in 1863. Today, part of the original rancho is kept as the Rancho Santa Teresa Historic District. The first adobe house of the rancho burned down a long time ago.

In 1844, a peace agreement called the Treaty of Santa Teresa (Tratado de Santa Teresa) was signed at the rancho. This agreement temporarily stopped fighting between Governor Manuel Micheltorena and a group led by former Governor Juan Bautista Alvarado.

RAMAC Park is named after the IBM 305 RAMAC. This was the first computer to use a disk drive. It was created at the IBM Santa Teresa Lab in the 1950s.

Exploring Santa Teresa's Location

Western Digital Headquarters in the Santa Teresa district of San Jose, California 2242 (cropped)
The headquarters of Western Digital.
Aerial view of Santa Teresa district in San Jose
An aerial view of Santa Teresa.

Santa Teresa is located in the southern part of San Jose. The Santa Teresa Hills separate it from Almaden Valley to the west. To the north of Coyote Valley, Santa Teresa is separated from the Madrone neighborhood of Morgan Hill.

To the northeast of Santa Teresa is Edenvale. To the northwest is Blossom Valley. Tulare Hill acts as a natural barrier between the southern tip of Santa Teresa and Coyote Valley.

The Cottle Transit Village is a special "Urban Village" within Santa Teresa. It is located in the north-central part of the neighborhood.

Parks and Green Spaces

Scenic view of Santa Teresa County Park. (38270510231)
A scenic view of Santa Teresa County Park.

Santa Teresa has several parks where you can enjoy nature and outdoor activities:

  • Santa Teresa County Park
  • Palmia Park
  • Los Paseos Park
  • George Page Park
  • Ramac Park
  • Raleigh Linear Park
  • Avenida España Park
  • Black Mountain Bowmen

Schools and Learning

Santa Teresa High School aerial view
Santa Teresa High School with Canoas Creek nearby.
Santa Teresa Library 1486 08
The Santa Teresa branch of the San José Public Library.

Most of Santa Teresa is served by the Oak Grove School District. This district includes:

  • Taylor Elementary School
  • Santa Teresa Elementary School
  • Bernal Intermediate School
  • Santa Teresa High School

The very southern parts of Santa Teresa are served by the Morgan Hill Unified School District. This district runs two schools in Santa Teresa:

  • Los Paseos Elementary School
  • Martin Murphy Middle School

Getting Around Santa Teresa

VTA train at Santa Teresa station, July 2018
A VTA light rail train at the Santa Teresa station.

Santa Teresa has three stations for the VTA light rail system. This makes it easy to travel around the area:

  • Cottle station on Cottle Road (in central Santa Teresa)
  • Santa Teresa station on Santa Teresa Boulevard (in southern Santa Teresa)
  • Snell station on Snell Road (serves both western Santa Teresa and Blossom Valley)

Important Places to See

Santa Teresa in Stories

Santa Teresa is the fictional home of Kinsey Millhone in Sue Grafton's "Alphabet" series of detective novels. However, in these books, Santa Teresa is described as a town in Santa Barbara County, far from the real Santa Teresa.

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