Dodero, Nicolas
Nicolas Dodero was an Italian-born sailor who left his ship in Yerba Buena (San Francisco) in 1827, was sent to Monterey (as was usual at that time with foreign immigrants), moved to San Jose in 1829, married in 1832, and presumably moved “over the hill” for (or prior to) his 1840 naturalization in Branciforte. He was granted the Tres Ojos de Agua (Three Eyes of Water) rancho on the upper Westside in 1844. Some sources credit Dodero with building a grist mill, but they may be confusing it with the Majors mill. Alternatively, Majors may have taken over the mill built by Dodero, or maybe they were two separate mills. A dead-end, unpaved Westside alley is named Dodero Street, but there’s no street sign. One of the small Tres Ojos creeks is named Dodero Creek, but only on the city’s Creek Management maps.
