Editor’s note: The first issue of La Voz, published on Sept. 11, 1967, was titled “De Anza College Vistas.” The name “La Voz de De Anza College” would make its first appearance two weeks later, on Sept. 29, 1967.

Vistas, as well as early editions of La Voz, did not have any bylines or photo attributions. Several articles in later issues would be attributed, but even as late as 1979, La Voz would run stories without bylines for the authors.

Although brand new, De Anza College boasts a fascinating his­tory and its namesake a proud part of California’s early growth.

aptain Don Juan Bautista de Anza was a Don, fighting men trained on the frontier of Mexico, sent by Spain to establish ports, protect settlements, mount cannons on points above the Pacific and protect Spanish ships. The Dons dressed them­ selves in arrow-proof leather and black capes, and rode on horses with highly decorated saddles.

De Anza was born in Mex­ico in 1735. His grandfather and father each served 30 years on the Mexico border, his father dying in a battle with Apache Indians. De Anza was fighting on the same Mexican frontier as his forbearers when in 1774 he was commissioned by the Mexican viceroy to start on the first of his two famous expeditions through California.

The fate of Spanish settlements hung in the balance — to bring supplies by sea involved long and hazardous voyages and placed a heavy burden on the royal treasury. Lower California was too sterile and impoverished to serve as a food depot for the struggling Spanish settlements in the north. There remained only one alternative — De Anza’s idea to open an overland supply route from Sonora, Mexico, to the California settlements in the north.

De Anza’s first expedition in 1774 brought him to the San Gabriel and Monterey misions.

Upon his return to Sonora, De Anza made preparations for his second expedition, the object of which was the settlement of San Francisco. 260 men, women and children and hundreds of cattle, mules and horses embarked in late 1775 on a trip that, after several months of very rough going, re­sulted in the settlement of San Francisco. On the way, Captain De Anza’s party camped on Stevens Creek, near the campus site.

Without the services of Captain Don Juan Bautista de Anza, there is little likelihood that Spanish settlements could have escaped destruction at the hands of the Indians or the dangers of the wilderness.

The history of the E.F. Euphrat estate, the land near which De Anza camped and on which the campus is built, goes back to the Civil War period, when it was Beaulieu Winery. About 1890 the acreage was purchased by Charles Baldwin, who developed the orchard and built for his bride Le Petit Trianon, which features arched French doors and windows, huge crystal chandeliers, curved interior doors with elaborate carvings and very high ceilings.

The property changed hands several times before being pur­chased by the Euphrats. At the time of the purchase of the estate in 1959 by the Foothill Junior College District, the site in­cluded a spacious five-room home, two guest cottages, a large barn and a producing prune and apricot orchard. Cost of the 100-acre estate was $1, 517,560. In 1962, a $14,000,000 bond issue was passed to build De Anza College, and construc­tion began in December of 1965. The campus, when finally com­pleted, will be worth approximately $22,000,000.

Archived from Volume 1, Issue 1.