Silicon Valley is a region in Northern California that is a global center for high technology and innovation. Located in the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area, it corresponds roughly to the geographical area of the Santa Clara Valley. The term "Silicon Valley" refers to the area in which high-tech business has proliferated in Northern California, and it also serves as a general metonym for California's high-tech business sector.
Palo Alto is a charter city in the northwestern corner of Santa Clara County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area, named after a coastal redwood tree known as El Palo Alto.
William Redington Hewlett was an American engineer and the co-founder, with David Packard, of the Hewlett-Packard Company (HP).
The Santa Clara Valley is a geologic trough in Northern California that extends 90 miles (140 km) south–southeast from San Francisco to Hollister. The longitudinal valley is bordered on the west by the Santa Cruz Mountains and on the east by the Diablo Range; the two coastal ranges meet south of Hollister. The San Francisco Bay borders the valley to the north, and fills much of the northern third of the valley. The valley floor is an alluvial plain that formed in the graben between the San Andreas Fault to the west and the Hayward and Calaveras faults to the east. Within the valley and surrounding the bay on three sides are the urban communities of San Mateo County, Santa Clara County, and Alameda County, while the narrow southern reaches of the valley extend into rural San Benito County to Hollister. In practical terms, the central portion of the Santa Clara Valley is often considered by itself, contained entirely within Santa Clara County.
David Packard was an American electrical engineer and co-founder, with Bill Hewlett, of Hewlett-Packard (1939), serving as president (1947–64), CEO (1964–68), and chairman of the board of HP. He served as U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defense from 1969 to 1971 during the Nixon administration. Packard served as president of the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences (USU) from 1976 to 1981 and chairman of its board of regents from 1973 to 1982. He was a member of the Trilateral Commission. Packard was the recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1988 and is noted for many technological innovations and philanthropic endeavors.
Stanford Research Park (SRP) is a technology park established in 1951 as a joint initiative between Stanford University and the City of Palo Alto. It was the world's first university research park. It has more than 150 companies, including Hewlett-Packard, Tesla Motors, TIBCO and VMware; previous high-profile tenants include Steve Jobs's NeXT Computer, Xerox PARC, and Facebook. It has been called "an engine for Silicon Valley" and "the epicenter of Silicon Valley".
Frederick Emmons Terman was an American professor and academic administrator. He was the dean of the school of engineering from 1944 to 1958 and provost from 1955 to 1965 at Stanford University. He is widely credited as being the father of Silicon Valley.
A California Historical Landmark (CHL) is a building, structure, site, or place in the U.S. state of California that has been determined to have statewide historical landmark significance.
HP Labs is the exploratory and advanced research group for HP Inc. HP Labs' headquarters is in Palo Alto, California and the group has research and development facilities in Bristol, UK. The development of programmable desktop calculators, inkjet printing, and 3D graphics are credited to HP Labs researchers.
Professorville is a registered historic district in Palo Alto, California that contains homes that were built by Stanford University professors. The historic district is bounded by Kingsley and Addison avenues and the cross streets of Ramona and Waverley. The community considers the district to be larger and bounded by Addison and Cowper St. to the north west and north east and Emerson St. and Embarcadero Rd. to the south west and south east.
Varian Associates was one of the first high-tech companies in Silicon Valley. It was founded in 1948 by Russell H. and Sigurd F. Varian, William Webster Hansen, and Edward Ginzton to sell the klystron, the first vacuum tube which could amplify electromagnetic waves at microwave frequencies, and other electromagnetic equipment. Varian Associates split into three companies in 1999: Varian Medical Systems, Varian, Inc. and Varian Semiconductor.
The Hewlett-Packard Company, commonly shortened to Hewlett-Packard or HP, was an American multinational information technology company headquartered in Palo Alto, California. HP developed and provided a wide variety of hardware components, as well as software and related services to consumers, small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs), and fairly large companies, including customers in government, health, and education sectors. The company was founded in a one-car garage in Palo Alto by Bill Hewlett and David Packard in 1939, and initially produced a line of electronic test and measurement equipment. The HP Garage at 367 Addison Avenue is now designated an official California Historical Landmark, and is marked with a plaque calling it the "Birthplace of 'Silicon Valley'".
William Alden Edson was a scientist and engineer specializing in vacuum tube oscillators, radar, antennas and microwave technologies. His work spans universities, research institutions and commercial ventures. He taught at Illinois Institute of Technology, Georgia Institute of Technology and Stanford University.
The rules of the garage are a set of eleven rules that attempt to encapsulate the work ethos that Bill Hewlett and David Packard set when they founded Hewlett-Packard. Since Hewlett-Packard was one of the earliest success stories of the information technology sector, it also used to more broadly describe the work ethos of Silicon Valley.
The HP 200A, first built in 1938, was the first product made by Hewlett-Packard and was manufactured in David Packard's garage in Palo Alto, California.
Sid Espinosa is an American businessman and politician. He is the former mayor of Palo Alto, CA, notably the first Hispanic to be elected to public office in that city's history, and at 38 years old at the time he was elected, he was one of the city's youngest mayors. He is also the Director of Corporate Citizenship for Microsoft Corporation in the Silicon Valley.
Alta Mesa Memorial Park is a non-denominational burial ground located in Palo Alto, California, United States. It was established in 1904 as a 72-acre (29 ha) cemetery. It includes traditional burial plots, a mausoleum and a columbarium.
Mayfield Mall was a shopping mall in Mountain View, California, United States. Operational from 1966 to 1984, it was the first air-conditioned, enclosed shopping mall in Northern California, though it has been an office complex since the 1980s. In 2013, Google rented the entire 500,000 square feet (46,000 m2) property and ultimately purchased it in 2016 for $225 million and is known as the company's Building RLS1.
Roy Clay Sr. is an American computer scientist and inventor. He was a founding member of the computer division at Hewlett-Packard, where he led the team that created the HP 2116A. He is the Chief Executive Officer of ROD-L electronics and has been involved with the development of electrical safety equipment.
