Remembering The Way To San Jose

I have noticed what seems to me to be one of the greatest untold stories of both the rock music era and the computer age. You can read it and form your own conclusion. I have suspected this but have not seen it anywhere else.

San Jose was a rural and agricultural community at the southern end of San Francisco Bay. The city manager of San Jose, from 1950 to 1969, was A. P. "Dutch" Hamann. He really wanted San Jose to grow, and it would become a major city by the end of his tenure.

He is remembered for making the following statement in 1965: "They say that San Jose is going to become another Los Angeles. Believe me, I'm going to do everything in my power to make that come true".

In 1967 San Francisco, to the north of San Jose, had a hit song about it concerning the Hippies coming from across the country to Haight-Ashbury. The song, San Francisco, was by Scott McKenzie, and it reminded those bound to San Francisco to "remember to wear flowers in their hair".

There was a popular singer named Dionne Warwick who, a few years earlier, had a memorable hit song titled "Anyone Who Had A Heart". Dionne Warwick was from New Jersey, had no connections to San Jose and, at the time, had never been there.

But there was a songwriter who worked with Dionne Warwick named Hal David. He had been stationed at San Jose while serving in the U.S. Navy. The city manager who wanted so much for San Jose to grow had also been in the Navy.

Dionne Warwick recorded what would become an international hit song, "Do You Know The Way To San Jose"? She said that she didn't like the song, at least until it became a major hit, and that she did it at the urging of Hal David.

A lot of people were moving out to California at the time but the major destination was southern California, the Los Angeles area.

The lyrics of the song contrasted Los Angeles with San Jose. If the song was about San Jose then why should it even mention Los Angeles, which is far to the south? The basic pattern of the song is a negative view of Los Angeles and then a contrasting positive view of San Jose.

Why would she sing about "getting back to San Jose" and having been "born and raised in San Jose" when, in fact, she had never been there at the time of the song?

The song goes on: (Credit to Google for lyrics).

"L.A. is a great big freeway

Put a hundred down and buy a car

In a week, maybe two, they'll make you a star.

Weeks turn into years. How quick they pass

And all the stars that never were

Are parking cars and pumping gas"

This portrays L.A., Los Angeles, as a false tinsel paradise that offers mainly empty promises of Hollywood stardom.

In contrast with the infamous smog and gridlock of Los Angeles, the song reminds us how easy it is to breathe and move in peaceful San Jose.

"You can really breathe in San Jose
They've got a lot of space. There'll be a place where I can stay
I was born and raised in San Jose
I'm going back to find some peace of mind in San Jose"

Once again, most of what Los Angeles has to offer is empty promises of stardom.

"Fame and fortune is a magnet
It can pull you far away from home
With a dream in your heart you're never alone
Dreams turn into dust and blow away
And there you are without a friend
You pack your car and ride away"

In stark contrast, what a friendly place San Jose is. Dionne has so many friends there, even if she has never been there.

"I've got lots of friends in San Jose
Do you know the way to San Jose?"

After listening to that song, San Jose sounds like our kind of place. Let's drop our plans to settle in a horrid place like Los Angeles and go to San Jose instead. It also contrasts with the earlier song about San Francisco by portraying San Jose instead as a family-oriented place that would be good to settle down and start a business. Not like San Francisco, to the north, and it's Hippies with plenty of LSD and "flowers in their hair".

When Dionne Warwick visited San Jose, after the song had become a hit, she described it as a "little country town".

As it turns out, that "little country town" that was the subject of Dionne Warwick's hit song is now the largest city of the San Francisco Bay area. San Jose is considered as the "capital of Silicon Valley" and is one of the wealthiest cities in the world. it is certainly one of the best places to live, at least for the people that can afford to live there.

if the internet began the following year, at UCLA in Los Angeles, then how did Silicon Valley end up so far to the north, centered today on San Jose and neighboring Palo Alto? Could Dionne Warwick's song have been more successful in diverting the flow from Los Angeles to San Jose?

What I cannot help wondering is whether this song was commissioned from the beginning, by a secret deal between the city manager of San Jose and Dionne Warwick's songwriter. I also wonder if Dionne herself knew about it.

At any rate, the whole world now knows the way to San Jose.