Named for Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés (c. 1485-1547), whose name at the time this street was christened – way back in 1884, on a piece of land owned by Andrew Glassell – was usually spelled “Hernando Cortez”, at least in the English language. How do I know this street honors him and not some other Cortez? Because on that old Glassell tract, what is now Belmont Avenue was called Aztec Avenue and what is now Dawson Street was called Montezuma Avenue. (The latter got shifted around and is now a dead-end alley called Montezuma Place.) Hernán Cortés destroyed the Aztec Empire in 1519-1521 and overthrew their emperor Moctezuma II, commonly known as “Montezuma”, so Glassell was clearly going for a theme here.
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