From Francisco Cantua's discovery in 1865 through the 1930s, Gilroy Hot Springs was a popular health and family resort centered on a single hot mineral spring near Coyote Creek under the guidance of the George Roop and William McDonald families. In 1938, H.K. Sakata, a successful Japanese American farmer from Watsonville, purchased the resort and renamed it Gilroy Yamato Hot Springs. It was the only Japanese American owned commercial hot springs in California, serving as a recreational and spiritual center for Japanese Americans before World War II and briefly as a hostel after the war for those returning from internment camps.