Purísima means "purest" in Spanish and is most commonly used in Spanish to refer to La Purísima Concepción (the Immaculate Conception) of the Virgin Mary (note historical misspelling in English resulting in double "s", or the result of the Holstein pronunciation with use of the "ẝ" being mistaken as ß "ss", or perhaps spelling comes from the local Portuguese influence, where the spelling from A Puríssima Conceição would be correct).

Located on José María Alviso's Rancho Cañada de Verde y Arroyo de la Purisima in a rural area four miles (6 km) south of Half Moon Bay, the village was one of the earliest settlements on the San Mateo County coast.

Henry Dobbel (born in the sovereign state of Holstein, then in a personal union with Denmark, on July 1, 1829; died in Purissima on December 22, 1891) came to California via Cape Horn in 1845.

A lumber mill was constructed at the mouth of Purissima Canyon, to take advantage of the extensive redwood logging in the nearby Santa Cruz Mountains.

Henry Dobbel bought the general store, only to encounter financial difficulties when he extended credit to many of his customers.

The Ocean Shore Railroad, which operated from San Francisco to Tunitas Creek from 1907 to 1920, included a stop at Purissima, as noted on a U.S. Geological Survey's Santa Cruz quadrangle map.

[9] According to the older maps, the school was located on the north side of what is now Verde Road, just east of Highway 1.

Its weathered gray buildings stand among mosshung cypresses and eucalyptus trees, their windows broken, their stairs falling in, their facades rudely stuck with gay circus posters.

"[11] The failure of the Ocean Shore Railroad, which was intended to provide better access to the San Mateo County coast, may have hurt Purissima, although the village was later included on the original routing of Highway 1.

Until the 1950s, however, much of the San Mateo County coastal area remained sparsely settled and the few surviving communities were relatively small.

Local newspaper articles have frequently mentioned that limited access to the area, primarily via Highways 1 and 92, has been a major factor in the slow growth.

With the completion of the Devil's Slide tunnel on Highway 1 in 2012, access to the coastal communities south of San Francisco improved.

In the summer of 2005, Dayna Chalif transcribed the existing gravestones in the Purissima Cemetery, which was long largely overgrown with weeds, vines, and poison oak, making it very difficult to access.