About Menlo Park, CA

Menlo Park is a city at the eastern edge of San Mateo County within the San Francisco Bay Area of California in the United States. It is bordered by San Francisco Bay on the north and east; East Palo Alto, Palo Alto, and Stanford to the south; and Atherton, North Fair Oaks, and Redwood City to the west. It is one of the most educated cities in California and the United States; nearly 70% of residents over 25 have earned a bachelor’s degree or higher. It had 33,780 residents at the 2020 United States Census. It is home to the corporate headquarters of Meta, and is where Google, Roblox Corporation and Round Table Pizza were founded. Its train station holds the record as having the oldest continually-operating train station in California. == Toponym == “Menlo” is derived from Menlo (the anglicized spelling of Irish Gaelic ‘Mionloch’, meaning ‘small lake’) in County Galway, Ireland. The name “Menlo Park” was given to a ranch purchased by Irish settlers in honor of their home village in Ireland. == History == The area of Menlo Park was inhabited by the Ohlone people when the Portolá expedition arrived in 1769.In 1795, the Rancho de las Pulgas land grant was made that included the area of the current city. In 1851, two Irish immigrants, Dennis J. Oliver and his brother-in-law D. C. McGlynn, purchased a 1,700-acre (690 ha) tract of land on the former Rancho de las Pulgas.