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began in earnest, accompanied by smaller
expeditions that revealed California’s valleys
and the true dimensions of San Francisco Bay.
Before his death in 1784, Serra traveled
repeatedly along the California coastline,
founding nine missions: San Diego (1769), San
Carlos Borromeo (1770), San Antonio (1771),
San Gabriel (1771), San Luis Obispo (1772),
San Francisco (1776), San Juan Capistrano
(1776), Santa Clara (1777), and San Buenaven-
tura (1782). Twenty-one missions would even-
tually line Alta California’s coast, from SanDiego in the south to St. Francis Solano in the
future town of Sonoma.CAPTAIN ANZA AND
FATHER GARCÉS
Spain’s new footholds in California renewed
interest in discovering a land route between
Sonora and the Pacific coast. Supplying strug-
gling California settlements by sea was dan-
gerous and costly. Establishing an overland(^152) B Discovery of the Americas, 1492–1800
The Role of California Missions =
The California mission system founded by Father Junípero Serra served both
secular and religious purposes. Militarily, missions reinforced Spain’s claim to
California against other European powers, particularly English mariners and
Russian sea otter hunters descending the Pacific coastline. Each mission
included a presidio, or fort, with a small number of soldiers.
The goal of Franciscan friars was not only religious conversion to Catholicism
but the complete absorption of local Indians into the Spanish empire. Indians
were required to live on mission grounds, speak Spanish, and wear European
clothing. If Native societies were thus transformed, missionaries believed, Indi-
ans would fulfill a dual role as both good Christians and faithful subjects of the
Spanish Crown.
European crops were cultivated on mission farms, including barley, beans,
and wheat, replacing traditional American Indian foods such as berries, fruit, and
nuts. Deadly diseases and disruption to traditional life that accompanied Euro-
pean arrival in California took a severe toll in Indian lives. This was especially
true in crowded mission living quarters. Harsh working conditions and anger
over unpunished crimes against Indians by soldiers caused bloody revolts
against the Franciscans. This legacy, combined with Father Serra’s penchant for
meting out corporal punishment, later disproved a long-idealized image of
happy so-called mission Indians. Native Americans protested when the Vatican
considered elevating the friar to sainthood in the 1980s, while Serra’s defenders
replied with crediting him for introducing European culture to California.
Father Serra considered California to be a province that should remain under
the exclusive control of the mission system, a view that often put him at odds
with Spain’s military and government authorities. Increasing numbers of
colonists with neither military nor church duties began to arrive in California in
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