Daily Alta California, Volume 1, Number 103, 29 April 1850
REPORT FROM THE SELECT COMMITTEE
On the Derivation and Definition
of the Names of the several Counties
of the State of California, &c.
MENDOCINO.— In the year 1535 Antonio de Mendoza, first Viceroy of New Spain, appointed by the Emperor, arrived at the city of Mexico, fourteen years after its conquest or surrender, and ordered a survey of the coast of California, in Cape Mendocino was discovered, and so called in honor of the Viceroy. Mendocino, from which the county derives its name, the patronymic of Mendoza.