Paint The Town – We’re Back In Person!

Save the date for Thursday, September 14, 2023 at 6:00PM!

We are incredibly excited to host you in person for the first time since 2019! Join us at the Gonzales/Peralta Adobe – Fallon House Historic Site located in Downtown San Jose for our much-anticipated annual fundraiser, Paint The Town. Curious about the details? Keep reading to find out all the insider information on this year’s much-anticipated event!

What is Paint The Town?

Every year, Rebuilding Together Silicon Valley hosts local leaders, corporate partners, individual volunteers, gracious donors, and former clients in celebration of the hundreds of no-cost, life-changing home repairs we complete annually. This event is a celebration of the year-round hard work and dedication put into our mission to repair homes, revitalize communities and rebuild lives. Paint The Town is also a fundraiser serving to sustain our programs and services that prevent homelessness, preserve the existing affordable housing stock, allow our vulnerable community members to remain safe in their homes, maintain a sense of dignity, and sustain a formidable asset to endure future generations.

Rebuilding Together Silicon Valley is incredibly grateful to have our community’s support since our founding in 1991. Over the 33+ years we have been serving Santa Clara County, your support has made it all possible. Through the pandemic, that support went above and beyond while we overcame challenges in the pandemic that showed us the resilience of our community. Thanks to you, we were met with great success when we switched Paint The Town to a virtual event. Now that county guidelines have been eliminated surrounding Covid-19, we are ecstatic to welcome you and yours back in person, so that we can once again share in that in-person magic we know is just irreplaceable.

Our program will showcase our life-changing mission, celebrate our community, feature an exciting raffle and live Fund-A-Need, delicious drinks, delectable small bites from Catered Too, and a live DJ. Our last two events were completely sold out and this is an event you won’t want to miss! Each ticket is tax-deductible and directly underpins the work we do in helping provide a real, tangible solution to the Silicon Valley housing crisis. For more information about tickets, visit our events page today!

Our Venue: The Gonzales/Peralta Adobe – Fallon House Historic Site

Image Source: History San Jose

The Gonzales/ Peralta Adobe

We are excited to host you at The Gonzales/ Peralta Adobe – Fallon House Historic Site at 175 W St John St, San Jose, CA 95110 on Thursday, September 14th at 6pm. Our team deliberated how to include a venue that demonstrated the importance of our mission and the impact of the work we complete. After careful thought and discussion, we partnered with History San Jose to show that when our community comes together to preserve our neighborhoods, we protect and foster our city’s vibrant culture, rich history, and can sustain valuable assets for future generations. Not only does the Gonzales/ Peralta Adobe – Fallon House Historic Site speak to our mission, but the historic site is also representative of the existing structural issues RTSV plans to address going forward surrounding home preservation and the historical inequities of the accumulation of generational wealth. At RTSV, we believe everyone deserves to live in a safe and healthy home and that access to a safe place to call home should be equitable.

Image Source: History San Jose

Originally built in 1797 by José Manuel Gonzales, the second mayor of San Jose and first resident of the home, the Gonzales/ Peralta Adobe is the last remaining structure from El Pueblo de San José de Guadalupe. The second resident was Luís María Peralta, who held the highest office in the community as commissioner. Both were part of the Juan Bautista de Anza expedition. Outside of the adobe, the horno, or working outdoor oven is still visible and inside, History San Jose furnished 2 rooms as examples of how the Gonzales or Peralta families may have lived (History San Jose).

The Adobe was owned by the Gonzales family until 1084 when Luis Maria Peralta was appointed as the commissioner of El Pueblo de San Jose in 1807. The Peraltas lived in the adobe until the 1870s when it was sold to Zeffiro Bastiani and Giovanni Spinetti for their fruit and wine business by Luis Maria Peralta’s grandson, Balthazar Peralta. From the 1870s until the 1960s, The Adobe was used primarily for storage for the businesses that occupied it until 1966 when The City of San Jose finally purchased The Adobe.

In 1973, volunteers from De Anza College History Center began restoration and fundraising efforts until 1975 when they officially raised enough money to accomplish the work they planned. The Gonzales/ Peralta Adobe was eventually added to the National Register of Historic places in 1974, 177 years after it was originally built. Currently, The Adobe is owned by The City of San Jose and maintained by History San Jose. In addition to hosting Paint The Town on Thursday, September 14th at 6pm, The Adobe annually hosts more than 6,000 students for educational programs all year and The City of San Jose’s Happy Birthday, San Jose event in November. When you join us for Paint The Town, you’ll be able to firsthand see the magic of preserving our housing stock when you look at The Adobe across the street from our main program at The Fallon House Historic Site portion of the The Gonzales/Peralta Adobe – Fallon House Historic Site.

The Fallon House Historic Site

Image Source: Hamilton Historical Records 

The second part of the Gonzales/Peralta Adobe – Fallon House Historic Site, The Fallon House, is located at 175 W St John St, San Jose, CA 95110. This beautiful Victorian style home was built by one of San Jose’s earliest mayors, served as a residence for the Fallons until 1900 when it was converted to the Italia Hotel and restaurant until 1990 when The City of San Jose purchased it and began restoring it to be The Fallon House Historic Site that we know today.

In 1848, Tom and Carmel Fallon were married and moved from Texas to San Jose in 1855. Carmel Fallon was the first woman in California to request a land grant in her own name and was granted Rancho Soquel, a parcel of land totaling about 35,000 acres on the coast south of Santa Cruz. They built and lived in the home on a parcel of land originally purchased from Manuel Gonzales, the first owner of the Gonzales/ Peralta Adobe. In 1876, Carmel filed for divorce after finding Thomas “in a compromising circumstances” with one of their maids (History San Jose).

Thomas Fallon was hired by Colonel John Fremont and his surveying team as they searched for a better route to the Oregon Trail (History San Jose). Later, Fallon led a team that raised the American flag in front of El Pueblo de San Jose de Guadalupe, claiming the territory for the US away from Mexico during the Mexican-American War without bloodshed. In 1988, a statue of Fallon was commissioned to be placed on West Julian Street in San Jose and has generated controversy since being installed in 1990.  Supporters of the statue state that it commemorates an important historical event for San Jose, but opponents worry that without context, the statue glorifies a troubling figure who treated Native Californians with violence to settle land for the US. The statue of Fallon was commissioned without public input (public art is now required to be discussed with the public before being commissioned) and in April of 2023, the statue was taken down after unanimous voting from San Jose’s City Council (City of San Jose).

Although the statue of Fallon was removed, the home he lived in still stands as part of the Gonzales/ Peralta Adobe – Fallon Historic Site. The home endured many generations of Fallons until it was converted to the Italia Hotel in 1900. The Italia Hotel became one of the most popular Italian restaurants in the valley serving guests like John Steinbeck and Charlie Chaplin. In 1990, The City of San Jose purchased the property to preserve it as part of the Gonzales/ Peralta Adobe – Fallon Historic Site. The Fallon Historic Site is a clear example of the importance of housing preservation. A home is more than the memories made there during one’s lifetime: with the proper resources, a home can prove to be a formidable asset that endures multiple generations and brings vibrance to our community.