San Mateo, California
San Mateo ( SAN mə-TAY-oh; Spanish for "Saint Matthew") is a city in San Mateo County, California, in the high-tech enclave of Silicon Valley in the San Francisco Bay Area. With a population of 97,207 as of the 2010 census, it is one of the larger suburbs on the San Francisco Peninsula, located between Burlingame to the north, Foster City and San Francisco Bay to the east, Belmont to the south, and Highlands-Baywood Park and Hillsborough to the west. The 2014 population was estimated to be 102,893. San Mateo was incorporated in 1894. By car, San Mateo is about thirty minutes from downtown San Jose and twenty-five minutes from downtown San Francisco.
History
Documented by Spanish colonists as part of the Rancho de las Pulgas (literally "Ranch of the Fleas") and the Rancho San Mateo, the earliest history is held in the archives of Mission Dolores. In 1789 the Spanish missionaries had named a Native American village along Laurel Creek as Los Laureles or the Laurels (Mission Dolores, 1789). At the time of Mexican Independence there were 30 native Californians at San Mateo, most likely from the Salson tribelet
