Thomas H. Selby purchased . A successful businessman, he served as mayor of San Francisco. His country estate was called "Almendral". John T. Doyle, an attorney, built a home off Middlefield Road, "Ringwood". James C. Flood purchased successive parcels and built an extravagant mansion, Linden Towers. This is now the neighborhood known as Lindenwood. The Joseph A. Donohoe estate was Holmgrove and is now the site of Menlo-Atherton High School. James Thomas Watkins' home was Fair Oaks and after two moves, stands restored today on Alejandra Avenue. The government was established with Edward E. Eyre as the first mayor. In 1928, the residents voted to build a Town Hall, which stands today. The early residents wanted a town that would be divided into large parcels and would not contain businesses. The author Gertrude Atherton, daughter-in-law of Faxon D. Atherton, wrote in "The Californians", "Menlo Park (Atherton) has been cut up into country places for what might be termed the 'old families of San Francisco', the eight or ten families who owned the haughty precinct were as exclusive, as conservative, as any group of ancient country families in Europe." A few of the large land holdings were subdivided during the 1920s and 1930s, including the James Flood estate in 1938. In the 1940s and 1950s over eighty subdivisions were recorded. With the minimum size of one acre (4,000 m²), the era of the large estates was over. Atherton is still a "plain of oaks". Native live oaks, white oaks, bays, redwoods, cedars, pines and other ornamental trees cover the six square miles (16 km²) of town. There are approximately of roads. The population is around 7,500 with approximately 2,500 households. Olive Holbrook-Palmer left Holbrook-Palmer Park, a 22-acre (89,000 m²) park, to the town in 1958. It is an open tree-covered park, which offers recreational programs and has facilities for functions. Atherton is located at . According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has a total area of , of which, of it is land and of it (0.63%) is water. Atherton lies southeast of Redwood City, and northwest of San Jose.