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The Beginning of ValenciaJoaquin CastroThe history of Valencia begins with the 1798 immigration of the General Joaquin Castro and family to Santa Cruz County, California. In the first half of the 1800's, Joaquin Castro's family of eleven children managed to acquire enough land grants from the Spanish and Mexican governments to include almost half of the land in what is now Santa Cruz County. The daughter marries Valencia.
The Rancho Aptos was the home of the family of Rafael Castro, son of Joaquin.
In 1850 Rafael's daughter, Maria, married Nicolas Valencia.
Maria received, as a gift from her father, 80 acres along the Santa Cruz -
Watsonville Road (Soquel Drive) near today's Rio del Mar overcrossing
of State Highway 1 in Aptos. This land became known as their Valencia
Farm and the creek running along its northwest border, Valencia Creek.
In 1870 Nicolas Valencia died rather unexpectedly, and Maria soon
remarried. Maria sold her Valencia Farm to Claus Spreckels in 1872 and
it
became part of Spreckels' vast holdings which stretched from the northern
boundary of Rancho Aptos, through today's Rio del Mar to the Pacific Ocean.
However, Nicolas Valencia's name remained associated with the creek
which
runs through the Aptos foothills.
An angry father, a new marriage and Hihn...
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| Valencia Hall Historical and Preservation Coalition |
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| Valencia_Hall@oocities.com | ||||
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