Rancho Sanel was a 17,754-acre (71.85 km2) Mexican land grant in present-day Mendocino County, California, given in 1844 by Governor Manuel Micheltorena to Fernando Feliz (or Felix).
Fernando De La Trinidad Feliz (May 30, 1795 in Los Angeles, California – November 12, 1859 in Hopland, California),[5] who was a regidor (town councilman) at the Pueblo of San José in 1831, was the grantee of Rancho Novato in 1839.
With the cession of California to the United States following the Mexican-American War, the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo provided that the land grants would be honored.
[9] Feliz' legal adviser, John Knight, received the northernmost one square league of the grant for his services.
Feliz sold land at low prices and advantageous terms to settlers, and his descendants had nothing left of the rancho but a town lot in East Hopland.