Origin of Name
In 1769, Gaspar de Portolà's expedition found large numbers of Grizzly Bears in the valley near modern Los Osos. "Osos" being the Spanish word for "Bears", the town was so named. The expedition was part of a plan by Spain to further colonize and map Alta California due to increasing colonization by the English on the East Coast of North America and the burgeoning presence of Russian traders on the West Coast. (See: Fort Ross, Russian-American Company.) de Portola's expedition was only one of four mandated by the Spanish Visitor General, José de Gálvez to map and explore Alta California in greater depth, following up on the previous expeditions, most notably the Cabrillo party in 1542 and that of Sebastián Vizcaíno, who vaguely mapped and described the Monterey Bay in 1602-3.
Read more about this topic: Los Osos, California
Famous quotes containing the words origin of and/or origin:
“The origin of storms is not in clouds,
our lightning strikes when the earth rises,
spillways free authentic power:
dead John Brown’s body walking from a tunnel
to break the armored and concluded mind.”
—Muriel Rukeyser (1913–1980)
“We have got rid of the fetish of the divine right of kings, and that slavery is of divine origin and authority. But the divine right of property has taken its place. The tendency plainly is towards ... “a government of the rich, by the rich, and for the rich.””
—Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)