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'Mission San Diego de Alcalá' was founded on July 16, 1769, the first in the twenty-one Alta California mission chain established by Father Presidente Junípero Serra; today it is known as "California's First Church." Spanish explorer Sebastián Vizcaíno named San Diego Bay ''San Diego de Alcalá'' when he made landfall there, some ten miles from the present Mission site, in 1602. The Mission was the site of the first Christian burial in Alta California;^[4] San Diego is also generally regarded as the site of the region's first public execution in 1778.^[9][10]

Contents

History

Other historic designations

Notes

References

See also

External links

History

Originally founded at a site known as "Presidio Hill" (''Kosoi'' to the natives), the settlment was relocated to its present location (''Nipowai'') in 1774.^[11] The Kumeyaay Indians rebelled against Spanish rule, and attacked the Mission on November 5, 1775. Father Luís Jayme, who had been left behind to run the Mission while Father Serra moved on to found other missions, was killed, making him California's first Christian martyr.^[12] Peace eventually settled over the area, and by 1797, there were approximately 1,400 Kumeyaay living in the vicinity of the Mission proper. Wheat, corn, wine grapes, barley, beans, cattle, horses, and sheep were the major crops. In 1795, construction on a system of aqueducts was begun to bring water to the fields and the Mission (the the first irrigation project in Upper California). The builder manager was Fray Pedro Panto, who was poisoned by his Indian cook ''Nazario'' before the project was completed.
After Mexico gained its independence from Spain in 1821, it decided that it was not profitable to maintain the missions. The Mexican Congress' ''Act for the Secularization of the Missions of California'' was ratified in 1834. The missions were offered for sale to citizens, who were unable to come up with the price, so all mission property was broken up into ''ranchos'' and given to ex-military officers who had fought in Mexico's war against Spain. In 1846, the Mission San Diego de Alcalá was given to Santiago Arguello. After the United States seized California, the Mission was used by the military from 1846 to 1862. In 1863, President Abraham Lincoln signed an act declaring that all of the missions would become the property of the Roman Catholic Church, and most of them remain so until today. When Mission San Diego de Alcalá was granted back to the Church, it was in ruins. In the 1880s Father Anthony Ubach began to restore the old Mission buildings. He died in 1907, however, and the restoration stopped until 1931. In 1941, the Mission once again became a parish church, in what is still an active parish serving the Diocese of San Diego. In 1976, Pope Paul VI designated the Mission church as a minor basilica.

Mission San Diego de Alcalá is located within San Diego city limits, near the intersection of Interstate 8 and Interstate 15, and approximately 1 mile east of Qualcomm Stadium.

Other historic designations

★ California Historical Landmark #52 — mission dam and flume system completed in 1816

★ California Historical Landmark #784 — El Camino Real (starting point in Alta California)

★ City of San Diego Historic Designation #113

Notes

1. Leffingwell, p. 17
2. Young, p. 14
3. Yenne, p. 24
4. Ruscin, p. 196
5. Yenne, p. 186
6. Engelhardt, ''San Diego Mission'', p. v.; 228 "''The military district of San Diego embraced the Missions of San Diego, San Luis Rey, San Juan Capistrano, and San Gabriel...''"
7. Ruscin, p. 195
8. Ruscin, p. 196
9. Ruscin, p. 196; Bancroft, vol. i., p. 316: Four native chiefs of ''Pámo,'' one of San Diego's Indian ''rancherías'', were convicted on April 6, 1778 of conspiring to kill Christians and were sentenced to death by José Francisco Ortega, Commandant of the Presidio of San Diego;the four were to be shot on April 11.
10. Engelhardt, ''San Diego Mission'', pp. 96-97. Reference is made to three letters written by Father Serra to Father Lasuén dated April 22 and June 10, 1778 and September 28, 1779 wherein Father Serra expresses his satisfaction over Governor Felipe de Neve's apparant grants of clemency in this regard. Based on these writings, Engelhardt concludes "''It would seem that the sentence of death was commuted. At any rate, there are no particulars as to an execution''."
11. Ruscin, p. 7
12. Ruscin, p. 11
13. Ruscin, p. 12

References

★ History of California, vols. i–vii (1542-1890), Bancroft, Hubert Howe, , , The History Company, San Francisco, CA, 1884-1880,

★ San Diego Mission, Engelhardt, Zephyrin, O.F.M., , , James H. Barry Company, San Francisco, CA, 1920,

★ California Missions and Presidios: The History & Beauty of the Spanish Missions, Leffingwell, Randy, , , Voyageur Press, Inc., Stillwater, MN, 2005, ISBN 0-89658-492-5

★ Mission Memoirs, Ruscin, Terry, , , Sunbelt Publications, San Diego, CA, 1999, ISBN 0-932653-30-8

★ The Missions of California, Yenne, Bill, , , Advantage Publshers Group, San Diego, CA, 2004, ISBN 1-59223-319-8

★ The Missions of California, Young, Stanley and Melba Levick, , , Chronicle Books LLC, San Francisco, CA, 1988, ISBN 0-8118-3694-0

See also

★ Spanish missions in California

★ Santa Ysabel Asistencia

★ Presidio of San Diego

★ Union Station (San Diego)

★ USNS ''Mission San Diego'' (AO-121) — a ''Mission Buenaventura'' Class fleet oiler built during World War II.

External links

★ Elevation & Site Layout sketches of the Mission proper

★ "Sociopolitical Aspects of the 1775 Revolt at Mission San Diego de Alcalá: an Ethnohistorical Approach" by Richard L. Carrico

★ Spanish Wiki page with Fray Pedro Panto´s biography