The Reverend William Charles Gianera was appointed the 22nd president of Santa Clara on October 30, 1945, succeeding the Reverend Charles Walsh, S.J.. Born in Stillwater, Minnesota in1890, Father Gianera was a student at Santa Clara from 1903-1907. He received an A.B. from Gonzaga University in 1919, and an A.M. in 1920. Father Gianera entered the Novitiate at Los Gatos on April 14, 1907, and was ordained in Ona, Spain on July 30, 1922. He served as an instructor at Santa Clara from 1914-1917, as Vice-President and Prefect of Discipline from 1926-1928, and as the Dean of Faculties and the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences from 1928-1945. After leaving the presidency, Father Gianera served as Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at Loyola University in Los Angeles, California, but later returned to Santa Clara to serve as assistant to the president under Father Herman Hauck, in 1955. Father Gianera celebrated his Golden Jubilee as a Jesuit at Santa Clara on August 18, 1957. He died on July 3, 1976.

Santa Clara University was founded in 1851 by the Society of Jesus as Santa Clara College and is California’s oldest operating institution of higher learning. It was established on the grounds of Mission Santa Clara de Asìs, the eighth of the original 21 California missions. The college originally operated as a preparatory school and did not offer courses of collegiate rank until 1853. The institution became known as the University of Santa Clara in 1912, when the schools of engineering and law were added. For 110 years, Santa Clara University was an all-male school. In 1961, women were accepted as undergraduates and Santa Clara University became the first coeducational Catholic university in California. The number of students and faculty tripled over the next decade and the university began the largest building program in school history with eight residence halls, a student union, and an athletic stadium. In the early 1970s, the Board of Trustees voted to limit the size of the undergraduate population, an action that was intended to preserve the character and ensure the quality of the university for generations to come. In 1985, the university adopted Santa Clara University as its official name. Bibliography: Santa Clara University. “About SCU – History.” www.scu.edu/about/history.cfm (Accessed Nov. 23, 2010) McKevitt, Gerald, S.J. The University of Santa Clara: A History, 1851-1977. Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 1979.