2. Background
• Felipe de Neve was the Spanish governor
of Las Californias, an area that included
present-day California, Baja California and
Baja California Sur
3. • He served as governor from 1777 to 1782.
• During his administration, Lieutenant José
Joaquín Moraga is credited with building
the Presidio of San Francisco after the site
was selected by Juan Bautista de Anza in
1776. Moraga is also known as the
founder of El Pueblo de San José de
Guadalupe, later known as San Jose,
California.
4. • San Jose served as a farming community to
support the Presidio of San Francisco and the
Presidio of Monterey.
• As the new governor of California, Neve
recommended to the viceroy of Mexico to
establish a settlement where Father Juan Crespi
met local Indians. Neve was granted authority
from The Crown, Charles III of Spain, to found
and establish El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la
Reina de los Angeles del Río de Porciúncula.
• Neve is regarded as one of the founding fathers
of today's Los Angeles, California.
5. Neve and LA
• Governor de Neve tackled the project with
enthusiasm, laying out exactly how the new town
would look: perhaps the first planned town in
North America. He not only laid out the plaza but
also determined where the pastures, royal lands,
and other divisions were to be located.
• Getting settlers from Mexico took 2 years (1771)
for the first to arrive, largely from Sonora. There
were 11 men, 11 women, and 22 children.
• On September 4, 1781, the new village was
founded.
6. LA’s Origins
• The new pueblo grew slowly. The houses were
very small, usually of adobe with flat roofs --
glassless windows, and rawhide doors. The
narrow streets were almost impassable when it
rained. There were no sidewalks or lawns, and
the trees along the river rapidly disappeared.
• By 1790 Los Angeles had 28 households and a
population of 139. By 1800 the city had 70
households and a population of 315. There were
also a town hall, guardhouse, army barracks,
and granaries.
7. • This Spanish town did not know that the
United States had been born and was
already moving relentlessly across the
continent. The first Yankee settler did not
arrive until about 1820.
