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Northern California, sometimes referred to as NorCal, is the northern portion of the U.S. state of California. The region contains the San Francisco Bay Area, including the state’s third largest city San Jose, a major center of government, commerce, and culture; the state capital, Sacramento; as well as the substantial natural beauty of the redwood forests, the northern California coast, the Big Sur coastline area, the Sierra Nevada including Yosemite Valley and Lake Tahoe, and Mt. Shasta, the second-highest peak in the Cascade Range.
Native Americans arrived in Northern California perhaps as early as 5,000 to 8,000 BCE, and successive waves of arrivals led to one of the most densely populated areas of pre-Columbian North America. The arrival of European explorers from the early 1500s to the mid-1700s, did not lead to European settlements in Northern California. The Spanish mission at Monterey was the first European settlement in the area, followed by other missions along the coast—eventually extending as far north as Sonoma County.

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News from the San Francisco Chronicle

Pinole high school evacuated as police search for gun

Jul 19, 2008 7:07 am

About 900 summer school students were being evacuated from Pinole Valley High School this morning as police with gun-sniffing dogs searched for a weapon that reportedly was brought on campus, official...

Judge refuses to drop case against Cosco Busan pilot

Jul 19, 2008 7:07 am

A federal judge refused today to dismiss criminal charges against the pilot of the container ship that struck the Bay Bridge in November and spilled more than 50,000 gallons of fuel oil into San Franc...

ChronicleWatch: Perfect storm of volunteerism

Jul 19, 2008 7:00 am

VOLUNTEERS NEEDED Ocean Beach cleanup: Every few weeks, ChronicleWatch is contacted about San Francisco's Ocean Beach. If it's not the beach itself, it's the trash cans there, or the roadway in front,...

State's jobless rate goes up again

Jul 19, 2008 7:00 am

California's unemployment rate rose again in June to reach 6.9 percent as tighter consumer spending started to expand job losses beyond the depressed housing and construction industry to other sectors...

Judge: water delivery system harms Calif salmon

Jul 19, 2008 2:24 am

A federal judge ruled Friday that California's water systems threaten to push native, wild salmon into extinction, but stopped short of ordering any immediate water cutbacks farmers said would have co...

Salmonella scare hit state growers hard

Jul 18, 2008 7:00 am

By the time the Food and Drug Administration cleared tomatoes Thursday in its investigation of a salmonella outbreak, California's tomato sales had plummeted more than 40 percent. "It's a governm...

California officials expand Countrywide lawsuit

Jul 17, 2008 11:18 pm

State officials expanded a previously filed lawsuit against Countrywide Financial Corp., adding allegations on Thursday that the mortgage lender rewarded staff for selling risky loans. The new claims ...

Peripheral canal urged to save the delta

Jul 17, 2008 7:00 am

After decades of thirsty cities and farms sucking water through the fragile Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta - the main valve for California's aging water system - only a man-made pipeline around th...

Bay Area home prices plunge 27% in last year

Jul 17, 2008 7:00 am

Double-digit drops in median home prices hit every Bay Area county in June, even the ones that had seemed Teflon-coated. Across the nine counties, the median price paid for resale homes, new homes and...

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