The historic center of Santa Clara Valley, Santa Clara's Mission Santa Clara de Asis, was founded in 1777 by Father Junipero Serra. A small community of Californios and Ohlones sprang up around it, which has now swelled to about 100,000. The makeup of the population has changed, of course, as has almost everything else about this densely-packed city. Its southern half is residential and largely middle-class. To the north are industrial parks which house some of the real giants of the technology industry: 3Com, Intel, Yahoo!, National Semiconductor, Applied Materials, and Synoptics.