Santa Clara founded in 1777 and incorporated in 1852, is a city in Santa Clara County, in the U.S. state of California. The city is the site of the eighth of 21 California missions, Mission Santa Clara de Asís, and was named after the mission. The Mission and Mission Gardens are located on the grounds of Santa Clara University. Saint Clare is the patron saint of Santa Clara.

Santa Clara is located in the center of Silicon Valley, and is home to the headquarters of Intel, Applied Materials, Sun Microsystems, NVIDIA, Agilent Technologies, and many other high-tech companies. It is home to both Mission College and Santa Clara University, the latter being the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of California.