Silicon Valley

Silicon Valley: Exploring the Communities Behind the Digital Revolution

"I don't know of a better introduction for a visitor to the Valley"
Michael S. Malone

A souvenir and guide to the Santa Clara Valley places that gave
birth to the silicon microchip, including Palo Alto, San Jose, and Stanford

Silicon Valley is the popular name for the Santa Clara Valley suburban communities where scientists and engineers learned how to turn sand (silicon) into gold (computer chips). The silicon integrated circuits (IC chips) that they created are the building blocks of the Digital Revolution. AMD Chairman W. J. Sanders III described them as the equivalent of “the crude oil of the Information Age.”

The first mass produced integrated circuit contained just eight components
(Fairchild Semiconductor- 1961)

In its 250 year transition from bountiful Ohlone tribal territory at the foot of San Francisco Bay to world-renowned technology powerhouse, Silicon Valley has become a place of legend and hyperbole. Promoters laud its combination of technology and egalitarian entrepreneurial culture as a progressive force for global change. Critics decry its destruction of farmland and worship of dollars over happiness. Marketing guru Regis McKenna claims it is not a place at all, but an attitude. For most of its nearly two million residents, from Nobel Prize winners to newly arrived immigrants, Silicon Valley is simply an exciting and challenging place to live and work, set in spectacular surroundings and blessed with an unbeatable climate.

“Surrounded with prolific orchards of choicest fruits, (Santa Clara) is one of the oldest and most delightfully located towns in the state.”

Adams and Bishop “Pacific Tourist” (1884)

“Silicon Valley is probably good. The Valley of Heart's Delight was a glory. We should have found ways of keeping one from destroying the other.”

Wallace Stegner Foreword to Passing Farms: Enduring Values  (1984)

The Hewlett Packard garage, Palo Alto

"The best way to predict the future is to invent it"
Alan Kay Palo Alto Research Center (1971)

The name Silicon Valley was bestowed on the southern shore of San Francisco Bay in the early 1970s after the essential material used by local computer chip manufacturers to drive the, then emerging, microelectronics revolution. At that time the Santa Clara Valley suburbs were still in transition from their previous incarnation as the prune capital of the world, promoted by local chambers of commerce as The Valley of Heart’s Delight, to today’s technological Mecca.

“The heart can delight in this new valley too ... in the thrill of being in one of the greatest technological and social transformations in history.”

Michael S. Malone
The Valley of Heart's Delight: A Silicon Valley Notebook 1963-2001  (2002)

Each area is characterized by a corresponding historical or contemporary quotation together with numerous color photographs accompanied by detailed caption information. An example of the section on the Milpitas, Santa Clara & Sunnyvale is shown below.

Praise for Silicon Valley:

"Silicon Valley's 100-plus year history of delivering innovative technology to the widest possible audience has enriched the lives of people throughout the world. David's images of the Valley today capture the essence of the communities that made it happen. And the adventure continues."
- W. J. Sanders III, Chairman, Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.

"Colorful images of Silicon Valley showcase both the history and excitement of this extraordinary region at the center of the world for computer technology."
- Leonard J. Shustek, Chairman, The Computer History Museum, Mountain View

"Finally! An up-to-date guide to both Silicon Valley and the Santa Clara Valley that lies beneath it. Concise and colorful, David Laws's book is also astonishingly complete. I don't know of a better introduction for a visitor to the Valley . . . nor a more compelling reminder to us locals of the remarkable community in which we live."
- Michael S. Malone, TV journalist, author of numerous books on Silicon Valley, and former editor of Forbes ASAP.

About the Author

Travel writer/photographer David A. Laws worked for Silicon Valley semiconductor companies for more than 30 years. His articles have appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle, San Francisco Examiner, San Jose Mercury News, the Oregonian, and other regional publications.

Click here for more biographical information

Silicon Valley: Exploring the Communities Behind the Digital Revolution

Price: $9.95

Publisher: Windy Hill Publications (ISBN#: 0-9723874-1-2)
124 color photos
6 ¾" x 9 ½", Saddlestich binding, printed on high quality, gloss paper