Editing Oakland, California (section)

===Spanish and Mexican eras===
[[File:Peralta Family.jpg|thumb|left|Oakland and much of the [[East Bay]] was part of [[Rancho San Antonio (Peralta)|Rancho San Antonio]], granted to [[Luís María Peralta]] in 1820. Here the Peralta family is pictured at their hacienda in Oakland, c. 1840.]]
In 1772, the area that later became Oakland was colonized, along with the rest of California, by Spanish settlers for the king of [[Spain]]. In the early 19th century, the Spanish crown granted the East Bay area to [[Luis María Peralta]] for his [[Rancho San Antonio (Peralta)|Rancho San Antonio]]. The grant was confirmed by the successor Mexican republic upon its independence from Spain.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://oakland-california.co.tv/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110411053608/http://oakland-california.co.tv/ |url-status=dead |archive-date=April 11, 2011 |title=Oakland-california.co.tv |publisher=Oakland-california.co.tv |access-date=April 19, 2012 }}</ref> Upon his death in 1842, Peralta divided his land among his four sons. Most of Oakland was within the shares given to Antonio Maria and Vicente.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.oaklandcaliforniarealestate.biz/History.asp |title=A Brief History of Oakland, California |publisher=Oaklandcaliforniarealestate.biz |access-date=April 19, 2012 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120324183040/http://www.oaklandcaliforniarealestate.biz/History.asp |archive-date=March 24, 2012 }}</ref> The portion of the parcel that is now Oakland was called ''Encinar'' (misrendered at an early date and carried forward as "encinal") &ndash; Spanish for "[[oak forest|oak grove]]" &ndash; due to the large oak forest that covered the area, which eventually led to the city's name.<ref name="ancestry1932">{{cite web|url=http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~npmelton/oakhist.htm |title=Oakland's Early History, Edson F. Adams, 1932 |publisher=Freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com |access-date=November 26, 2013}}</ref>

According to [[Stanford University]] historian Albert Camarillo, the Peralta family struggled to keep their land after the incorporation of California into the United States after the [[Mexican–American War]]. Camarillo claims the family was the victim of targeted [[racial violence]]. He writes in ''Chicanos in California'', "They lost everything when squatters cut down their fruit trees, killed their cattle, destroyed their buildings, and even fenced off the roads leading to the rancho. Especially insidious were the actions of attorney [[Horace Carpentier]], who tricked Vicente Peralta into signing a 'lease' which turned out to be a mortgage against the 19,000-acre rancho. The lands became Carpentier's when Peralta refused to repay the loan he believed was fraudulently incurred. The Peraltas had no choice but to abandon the homesite they had occupied for two generations."<ref>{{cite book |last1=Camarillo |first1=Albert |title=Chicanos in California: A History of Mexican Americans in California |date=1979 |publisher=Boyd & Fraser |isbn=978-0878351282 |page=16 |edition=1 |url=https://archive.org/details/chicanosincalifo00albe |access-date=July 29, 2020}}</ref>