Latest / California Frontier / 055: Secrets of Mission San Luis Rey Part 1 with Art Historian Helena Hazleton

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055: Secrets of Mission San Luis Rey Part 1 with Art Historian Helena Hazleton · California Frontier

• 0:00
  Helena Hazleton (2): at some point it administrated close to 950, 000 acres of land.
• 0:06
  Helena Hazleton (2): More than, about 7,000 people were baptized, been in a matter of 45 years.
• 0:14
  Helena Hazleton (2): Uh, the active population was about 3000, which was the largest of any mission.
• 0:19
  Helena Hazleton (2): he built about five missions in a matter of three years I believe.
• 0:23
  Helena Hazleton (2): And San Luis Rey was one of those five missions, actually it was the last one.
• 0:32
  Welcome to California Frontier, the show about the often overlooked and unexpected early history of the place we call California.
• 0:41
  I'm your host, Damian Basich.
• 0:51
  Damian Bacich: Today I'm honored to have with me Elena Hazleton, who is the director of the museum, correctly if I'm wrong, at Mission Luis Rey de Francia in Oceanside, California.
• 1:05
  Damian Bacich: So I'm hoping that today we're going to have an interesting conversation about some of the things that I think are really Unique about this mission.
• 1:16
  Damian Bacich: And Elena has a lot of expertise and a lot of background.
• 1:20
  Damian Bacich: So thank you Elena for being here.
• 1:23
  Helena Hazleton: Thank you for
• 1:24
  Helena Hazleton (2): me.
• 1:26
  Damian Bacich: we met about maybe a year and a half ago.
• 1:30
  Damian Bacich: I think it was probably in the spring or April, I think in April of 2023.
• 1:36
  Damian Bacich: When the California Missions Foundation organized a day at Mission San Luis Rey, if I'm not mistaken.
• 1:47
  Damian Bacich: And you provided some really interesting tours of the mission, the mission grounds, the church.
• 1:54
  Damian Bacich: And I came away really wanting to know more about this mission.
• 2:00
  Damian Bacich: and really, impacted by the uniqueness of it and the, the different it's history and the different artifacts and artworks and things that are there.
• 2:13
  Damian Bacich: So.
• 2:14
  Damian Bacich: Before we begin, would you mind telling us a little bit about yourself and how you wound up working with Mission San Luis Rey?
• 2:29
  Helena Hazleton (2): Well, I am not from California.
• 2:32
  Helena Hazleton (2): I'm originally from Mexico City.
• 2:34
  Helena Hazleton (2): I was born and raised there.
• 2:36
  Helena Hazleton (2): I went to school to study art history.
• 2:41
  Helena Hazleton (2): I studied at Universidad Iberoamericana.
• 2:44
  Helena Hazleton (2): In Mexico City and I ended up starting my career, eh, mostly teaching but I also worked from about 2012 to 2017 at a Muso May, which houses one of the largest private art collections in the world.
• 3:04
  Helena Hazleton (2): And it has a beautiful Spanish colonial collection as well.
• 3:09
  Helena Hazleton (2): I came to California in 2017, just randomly.
• 3:13
  Helena Hazleton (2): My husband lived here and we met before I moved in.
• 3:19
  Helena Hazleton (2): We decided to get married.
• 3:21
  Helena Hazleton (2): It was just easy for me to come here.
• 3:25
  Helena Hazleton (2): And we ended up living three blocks from Mission San Luis Rey.
• 3:30
  Helena Hazleton (2): And trying to find something to do in a new, completely new place for me.
• 3:35
  Helena Hazleton (2): I came to Mission San Luis Rey and I stayed and I've been here for a little over seven years
• 3:40
  Damian Bacich: Wow.
• 3:40
  Damian Bacich: Well, not so random.
• 3:43
  Damian Bacich: Pretty intentional in some ways, but, but that's great.
• 3:47
  Damian Bacich: So you, I guess you saw a connection between your background and your expertise and.
• 3:55
  Damian Bacich: And what was going on at the mission, I assume.
• 3:58
  Helena Hazleton (2): absolutely.
• 3:59
  Helena Hazleton (2): Coming from Mexico city, it's very clear that missions are familiar to us, uh, for many different reasons.
• 4:06
  Helena Hazleton (2): But the thing that attracted me to the mission is, well, I went into the church and I saw, you a couple of paintings and the statues that are on display in the church, and I just thought that this is where I belonged, making sure that that I'm studying what is going on
• 4:24
  Damian Bacich: Well, good.
• 4:24
  Damian Bacich: I think you're doing a real, a real service to all of us who want to know more about the history of California, especially as it connects to Mexico and to the Spanish empire and to these places that I think that.
• 4:40
  Damian Bacich: You know, most Californians grow up learning about the missions, um, when they're in fourth grade.
• 4:45
  Damian Bacich: And I think that's great.
• 4:46
  Damian Bacich: I try to support that, as you probably know.
• 4:50
  Helena Hazleton (2): Yep, I run a fourth grade program at the
• 4:52
  Damian Bacich: you go.
• 4:53
  Damian Bacich: So, but oftentimes that's it, right?
• 4:56
  Damian Bacich: That's where it stops.
• 4:57
  Damian Bacich: And when you talk to people about their knowledge of the mission, The mission era of the California missions and that that time of its history, either they're very dismissive.
• 5:09
  Damian Bacich: Well, yeah, we did a mission project when I was in fourth grade, or they know very little at all.
• 5:14
  Damian Bacich: Or they've heard just some basic things.
• 5:19
  Damian Bacich: But being there.
• 5:21
  Damian Bacich: You, you were able to pull out a lot of very nuanced and fascinating aspects of that place and of that time period.
• 5:33
  Damian Bacich: So I'm wondering, before we, we get deep into that, could you maybe give us a little bit of a sketch of Mission San Luis Rey, you know, how it started a little background on its history.
• 5:48
  Helena Hazleton (2): so to make a really long story, Short.
• 5:52
  Helena Hazleton (2): Mission San Luis Rey is the 18th of the California missions that were established.
• 5:59
  Helena Hazleton (2): It's one of the latest ones but it was also one of the largest.
• 6:04
  Helena Hazleton (2): One of the things that friars and explorers noticed In the late 1790s is that there was a need for a, a mission that connected San Diego and San Juan Capistrano.
• 6:18
  Helena Hazleton (2): So there were a few attempts to, to find a suitable location for the mission.
• 6:24
  Helena Hazleton (2): And they ended up in a valley eh, today it's called the San Luis Rey Valley where the original Payómkawichumn people live, or the Luiseño people, as they are known.
• 6:38
  Helena Hazleton (2): Officially today, they established the mission.
• 6:42
  Helena Hazleton (2): Father Laswin came June of 1798 to perform a baptismal ceremony.
• 6:51
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, six weeks, six weeks later, he left, left a very young father, Antonio Petty, in charge of building a community and building a, what would be the, the foundation, the structure of the building and the mission just started.
• 7:04
  Helena Hazleton (2): Continued, started growing then, and it didn't stop until Mexican secularization.
• 7:10
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, it became the largest, the most productive of California missions.
• 7:16
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, at some point it administrated close to 950, 000 acres of land.
• 7:22
  Helena Hazleton (2): More than, we have the padrones and the inventories, uh, In the 1820s, there were more than 50,000 heads of cattle, eh, several ranches, eh, rancher, eh, and ascia.
• 7:36
  Helena Hazleton (2): That depended on mission sandwich Rey.
• 7:38
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um.
• 7:39
  Helena Hazleton (2): More than, uh, about 7,000 people were baptized, been in a matter of 45 years.
• 7:48
  Helena Hazleton (2): Uh, the active population was about 3000, which was the largest of any mission.
• 7:53
  Helena Hazleton (2): And it just was a very powerful institution.
• 7:57
  Damian Bacich: So this is really, uh, I think something that a lot of people don't understand.
• 8:02
  Damian Bacich: Mission San Luis Rey is directly north of San Diego and we're in, uh, Oceanside.
• 8:08
  Damian Bacich: What is today Oceanside?
• 8:10
  Damian Bacich: But you mentioned it's the 18th.
• 8:12
  Damian Bacich: of the missions.
• 8:13
  Damian Bacich: So, um, why so late?
• 8:18
  Damian Bacich: Um, well, 1798.
• 8:20
  Damian Bacich: Yeah, why, why so late?
• 8:21
  Damian Bacich: And, um, even though it's right one, a few miles up north from San Diego.
• 8:31
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, well, we don't know exactly why so late.
• 8:35
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, what I know is that Father in the late 1790s, he, uh, uh, set up a in the, in.
• 8:43
  Helena Hazleton (2): a program, an institution to connect pre existing missions where he saw the need because there were a few rancherias or because the the friars were tired of traveling maybe more than a day to do a funeral or a baptism.
• 8:58
  Helena Hazleton (2): So he connected, he built about five missions in a matter of three years I believe.
• 9:04
  Helena Hazleton (2): And San Luis Rey was one of those five missions, actually it was the last one.
• 9:09
  Helena Hazleton (2): Eh, and it was, it came in an attempt to, to connect to preexisting missions.
• 9:14
  Helena Hazleton (2): So people here, eh, were served by either San Juan Capistrano or San Diego, but it was hard for the friars on either of those missions to travel more than a day to minister in.
• 9:29
  Helena Hazleton (2): In this.
• 9:30
  Helena Hazleton (2): Rancherías and populations.
• 9:32
  Helena Hazleton (2): It was also a different tribe that spoke a different language.
• 9:35
  Helena Hazleton (2): The Kumeyaay and the Luiseño have different languages, so they saw the need to bring a particular institution for the Luiseño
• 9:43
  Damian Bacich: And so the Kumeyaay are the people who live in the vicinity of Mission San Diego.
• 9:47
  Helena Hazleton (2): Exactly.
• 9:48
  Helena Hazleton (2): Yeah.
• 9:49
  Damian Bacich: and can you, um, just remind everyone of those two terms that you used?
• 9:53
  Damian Bacich: You use the term rancheria and a term asistencia.
• 9:57
  Damian Bacich: Can you tell us a little bit about what those mean?
• 10:01
  Helena Hazleton (2): Well, rancherías were small populations, mostly of indigenous people.
• 10:07
  Helena Hazleton (2): Some of them were people who were already baptized, and other villages were people that were still yet to be baptized, but Already had an idea of what, um, what being at a mission was part of a, an assistencia is like a sub mission.
• 10:22
  Helena Hazleton (2): Uh, it's, uh, a center of operation of mission San Luis Rey, or any other mission that had an assistencia, but in a separate location, sometimes when missions were, or, or administrate large territories, it was necessary to have an assistencia to either store grains or have a small chapel.
• 10:43
  Helena Hazleton (2): that can minister people, and it would depend, uh, completely on the big mission.
• 10:49
  Helena Hazleton (2): Asistencia, well, San Antonio de Palo, which was the Asistencia of Mission San Luis Rey, uh, it's unofficially known by some people as the 22nd mission, because of how important it was.
• 11:01
  Damian Bacich: Yeah, San Antonio de Paula is, is also a really interesting place, and it's, it's still a functioning church and parish.
• 11:08
  Damian Bacich: Um, yeah, it, so that was the most important as asistencia connected to Mission San Luis Rey.
• 11:15
  Damian Bacich: And, and so what I'm, what I understand is that there were populations of people who lived out there at these asistencias, and it was the, the Mission Padre who would come from time to time to visit them, right?
• 11:33
  Damian Bacich: Okay.
• 11:34
  Damian Bacich: How many, do you know offhand how many asistencias were connected to Mission San Luis Rey?
• 11:40
  Helena Hazleton (2): Well, the only official asistencia was San Antonio de Pala, but there were granaries and, uh, small buildings at Las Flores and Rancho Santa Margarita, which are part of, uh, today they're part of a, a military base and, uh, a marine base, Camp
• 11:58
  Damian Bacich: Oh, that's right.
• 11:59
  Damian Bacich: You know what?
• 12:00
  Damian Bacich: In fact, I was, I had the privilege of visiting, um, Santa Margarita Las Flores on Camp Pendleton Last summer and I have some, some really cool footage that I need to edit and put
• 12:15
  Helena Hazleton (2): I'm going next week.
• 12:17
  Helena Hazleton (2): Yeah, we are going, the, the docents and I are doing a field trip
• 12:20
  Damian Bacich: That's a really interesting place.
• 12:22
  Damian Bacich: And very few people get to go visit because it's on Camp Pendleton on the Marine base.
• 12:26
  Damian Bacich: Wow.
• 12:27
  Damian Bacich: Okay.
• 12:28
  Damian Bacich: So that's really interesting.
• 12:30
  Damian Bacich: So, at its, at its height, you said that the mission was, it's.
• 12:37
  Damian Bacich: one of the most, if not the largest and most productive of the mission chain.
• 12:43
  Damian Bacich: Um, can you tell us a little bit about the phases of its history?
• 12:48
  Damian Bacich: Obviously, there's a time when it was recently founded, then there's its height, and then you have the, can you talk a little bit about that?
• 12:55
  Damian Bacich: How the arc of the history of this mission?
• 13:00
  Helena Hazleton (2): it starts, it's a rare case of a mission that starts strong with a, with a population that starts growing very fast.
• 13:10
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, there is like a early phase of growth between, I would say, nine, 17 and 98.
• 13:19
  Helena Hazleton (2): to around 1810, uh, when the mission starts becoming productive, um, the construction of the mission church.
• 13:28
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, the mission church is one of the most beautiful mission churches, in my opinion.
• 13:34
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, it's certainly the largest.
• 13:37
  Helena Hazleton (2): the only one that is still standing on a cruciform layout.
• 13:40
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, the construction of the church was, uh, reflective of that period of growth.
• 13:46
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, the mission starts with a small chapel that they eventually expand.
• 13:50
  Helena Hazleton (2): But by 1811, they, uh, It was not enough.
• 13:55
  Helena Hazleton (2): They thought they needed a larger church, so they set up a construction of the current church that we have, Third Church, and construction of the church took place between, I would say, 1811 to 1815.
• 14:10
  Helena Hazleton (2): That's when it's finished.
• 14:13
  Damian Bacich: Oh, go ahead.
• 14:16
  Helena Hazleton (2): No, you were
• 14:16
  Damian Bacich: Well, you make, when you say 1811 to 1815, it makes me think that there was a massive earthquake in 1812.
• 14:25
  Damian Bacich: So, how did this mission manage to survive that earthquake while San Juan Capistrano, up the road, was, was destroyed and so many people died?
• 14:37
  Helena Hazleton (2): Well, the church was under construction back then.
• 14:42
  Helena Hazleton (2): And, uh, there, there was an architect.
• 14:45
  Helena Hazleton (2): You might have, uh, have heard of the architect that traveled from missions to mission, uh, uh, Letting friars know that he was available.
• 14:55
  Helena Hazleton (2): He brought manuscripts, um, and he came to see what was done after the earthquake.
• 15:02
  Helena Hazleton (2): We had only one wall that was built then, the east wall.
• 15:06
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, construction was adapted a little bit.
• 15:09
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, there are legends.
• 15:11
  Helena Hazleton (2): There's, this is not something that was recorded anywhere, but most people still believe that the original Two bell tower plan that they had initially was adapted because San Juan Capistrano, the reason why the church was destroyed is one of the bell towers fell into the nave of the church.
• 15:29
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, some people think that that might have been something that changed the, the layout or the construction of the church.
• 15:37
  Helena Hazleton (2): We are not very sure if that was actually the case.
• 15:41
  Helena Hazleton (2): Uh, but we have one bell tower, uh, and.
• 15:45
  Helena Hazleton (2): Construction was adapted.
• 15:46
  Helena Hazleton (2): There were some things that people used to do back in the day to reinforce a building if there was an earthquake, like to build wider walls.
• 15:58
  Helena Hazleton (2): Make less windows, open less windows, um, reinforce more with more columns, uh, uh, smaller roof as well.
• 16:08
  Helena Hazleton (2): So there were things that were adapted, but Mission San Luis Rey, because the church was not finished when the church, when the earthquake came, um, it did not change the layout too much.
• 16:19
  Helena Hazleton (2): Mm hmm.
• 16:19
  Helena Hazleton (2): Mm
• 16:20
  Damian Bacich: it's so, it's, it's amazing to think that, you know, here we are in California and 200 years ago is the earthquakes or something immemorial here in California, you always had to be dealing with them.
• 16:36
  Damian Bacich: And the fact that they the.
• 16:43
  Damian Bacich: The architecture of the building while it's being, while it's being built in order to, to, um, to withstand earthquakes is, is really interesting, especially given the fact that so many of the missions now are being required to, to be retrofitted for, uh, seismic activity have, Has San Luis Rey needed to go through a modern retrofit?
• 17:12
  Helena Hazleton (2): yes, it was finished a little over 10 years ago.
• 17:15
  Helena Hazleton (2): Our church has been retrofitted,
• 17:17
  Damian Bacich: Okay.
• 17:18
  Damian Bacich: And then, then what about secularization?
• 17:23
  Damian Bacich: We know that in the 1830s, right, that the missions are, are secularized.
• 17:29
  Damian Bacich: That is, they're put in the hands of lay administrators.
• 17:31
  Damian Bacich: What was that process like at San Luis Rey.
• 17:37
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, well, secularization comes, um, in the early 1830s.
• 17:43
  Helena Hazleton (2): And when, uh, the friars that were in California are given the option of either swear allegiance to a new government or go back to, to Spain, um, The person who administrated the mission, Father Antonio Peire, who was a very powerful man, um, he decides to go back to Spain.
• 18:01
  Helena Hazleton (2): So that was the first thing that affected the mission, because after his, his departure, um, the mission just started losing more and more of its territory to, uh, the, the political favors that the Mexican governors, uh, started doing.
• 18:21
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, The, uh, Father Perry leaves, uh, that's another thing that is special about Mission St.
• 18:28
  Helena Hazleton (2): Louis Rey, the plan Father Perry had.
• 18:31
  Helena Hazleton (2): after secularization because he doesn't live on his own.
• 18:34
  Helena Hazleton (2): He takes with him two young boys, um, who grew up at the mission, Agapito, Amamix, Pablo Tac, and his plan was to put these boys, um, they were 12 and 10.
• 18:48
  Helena Hazleton (2): Agapito was 12, Pablo was 10.
• 18:50
  Helena Hazleton (2): His plan was to find a Franciscan school for the boys where they can become missionaries and they are the ones who can come back.
• 18:57
  Helena Hazleton (2): and continue the, the, the labor that he did for 30 something years.
• 19:03
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, after a two year trip that takes them to Mexico City, then New York, and then Rome, uh, the boys stay at the Colegio de la Propaganda FIDE, uh, in Rome.
• 19:15
  Helena Hazleton (2): And father Perry goes back to Spain.
• 19:17
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, the last thing people know about him is that he was trying to get a passport to come back to California, but there's nothing else that, that people know.
• 19:26
  Helena Hazleton (2): After that, we know he never came back.
• 19:29
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, he was elderly, he was sick.
• 19:32
  Helena Hazleton (2): And he probably died in Spain, although nobody knows for sure where he was buried.
• 19:36
  Helena Hazleton (2): Probably close to his hometown, near Barcelona.
• 19:39
  Helena Hazleton (2): He was from Catalonia, and the boy stayed in Rome.
• 19:43
  Damian Bacich: So, so
• 19:45
  Helena Hazleton (2): Passed away
• 19:45
  Damian Bacich: you're right.
• 19:46
  Damian Bacich: Yes.
• 19:46
  Damian Bacich: So, uh, Pablo attack writes, The only grammar of indigenous language in California at the time, right?
• 19:54
  Damian Bacich: And he writes a story of his life at the mission.
• 19:58
  Damian Bacich: Um, the propaganda feed, that's the college in Rome where missionaries were trained, right?
• 20:05
  Helena Hazleton (2): Yes.
• 20:05
  Damian Bacich: the idea was that these young men would come back to California as missionaries to their own people.
• 20:12
  Helena Hazleton (2): Mhm.
• 20:13
  Helena Hazleton (2): Yes,
• 20:14
  Damian Bacich: that's, that's really interesting.
• 20:16
  Damian Bacich: Now, Father, but they, their life is cut short by, by disease, I'm assuming?
• 20:23
  Helena Hazleton (2): yes, Agapito dies, I believe it was smallpox, at the age of 17 in Rome.
• 20:31
  Helena Hazleton (2): And Pablo was also affected, he was sick, but when he was around 16, 17 years old, he catches the attention of an important person, Cardinal Giuseppe Mesofanti, he was a linguist, important person in Rome as well.
• 20:50
  Helena Hazleton (2): And it is Cardinal Mezzofanti who encourages Pablo to write the story of his people.
• 20:56
  Helena Hazleton (2): And, uh, uh, it's the grammar of his language as well.
• 21:01
  Helena Hazleton (2): Without knowing, Pablo Tagg probably saved his language.
• 21:05
  Helena Hazleton (2): It is, the Luiseno are still struggling to save their language, and it's probably Pablo Tagg the one that helped.
• 21:12
  Helena Hazleton (2): Because he left a written record of how the language sounded.
• 21:16
  Damian Bacich: Right.
• 21:16
  Helena Hazleton (2): Uh.
• 21:17
  Helena Hazleton (2): Yeah, Pablo Tak, after struggling with being ill for a few years, he also dies pretty young in Rome.
• 21:25
  Damian Bacich: Yeah, what a shame.
• 21:27
  Damian Bacich: I've, I've read through his, um, his grammar and his, and his, uh, uh, story, that conversion of San Luiseño's, and It's not only written in Spanish and Luiseño, it's in as well, so he was,
• 21:42
  Helena Hazleton (2): Yeah.
• 21:43
  Damian Bacich: very well educated, uh, there, and, yeah, what a, what, it's really interesting to think how history might have been different had he survived and had he come back to California.
• 21:54
  Helena Hazleton (2): Yes.
• 21:55
  Damian Bacich: So, Perin was, uh, the Franciscan who really sort of made the mission into what it was.
• 22:04
  Damian Bacich: Can you tell us a little bit more about him?
• 22:07
  Damian Bacich: You mentioned he was a very powerful man.
• 22:10
  Helena Hazleton (2): Well, Pablo Tac in his, uh, in his manuscript, it describes him as basically living the life of a king.
• 22:18
  Helena Hazleton (2): He had a, like a small court according to Pablo Tac and pages.
• 22:23
  Helena Hazleton (2): Uh, but he was also a very intelligent and a very good administrator.
• 22:30
  Helena Hazleton (2): I believe that's what made Mission San Luis Rey so prosperous.
• 22:34
  Helena Hazleton (2): It was his, his view and his administration basically, and his willingness to negotiate with, with the local people as well.
• 22:43
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, you'll hear stories of, uh, how there were other rebellions at missions like Santa Barbara, San Diego.
• 22:52
  Helena Hazleton (2): San Diego, um, particularly this year, it's the, the 200th anniversary of the, uh, the Chumash, uh, riots, the rebellions.
• 23:01
  Helena Hazleton (2): That was never an issue at San Luis Rey, and it was probably because Father Perry was a good negotiator.
• 23:08
  Helena Hazleton (2): He knew how much to intervene, um, and I'm not saying that the Native people lived a Pretty life at the mission.
• 23:18
  Helena Hazleton (2): That was not the case.
• 23:20
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, it was the 1800s, um, you would still have alcaldes, mayordomos, soldiers, and there are some pretty cruel accounts of, of life at the mission, but I also believe that Father Perry understood how much he could get away with without, making enemies for himself.
• 23:41
  Damian Bacich: Right.
• 23:41
  Damian Bacich: And that's a really, really important talent, right?
• 23:45
  Damian Bacich: Especially out on the frontier.
• 23:47
  Damian Bacich: And people forget that, uh, even though the Spanish were, um, in charge of this territory that they were colonizing, they were.
• 23:58
  Damian Bacich: The small minority compared to the indigenous people that were around.
• 24:02
  Damian Bacich: And I think just looking recently at statistics and, I mean, indigenous people were the vast majority in California up until just following the gold rush, right?
• 24:16
  Damian Bacich: So, you, you had to be very, uh, astute in order to maintain this equilibrium, like you said.
• 24:24
  Damian Bacich: When an uprising was possible at any time, if things went sideways, and, and as people may know, uh, there, we have a, a great interview with Dr.
• 24:35
  Damian Bacich: John Johnson, um, from Santa Barbara, who used to direct the Santa Barbara Natural History Museum about the, the Chumash uprising, which is really fascinating if you haven't listened to it, you should go back and listen to it.
• 24:48
  Damian Bacich: Um, so what about the, um, The period then between, say, the time that Father Perry leaves and the time that the U.
• 25:00
  Damian Bacich: S.
• 25:00
  Damian Bacich: takes over, what was life like at the mission then?
• 25:05
  Helena Hazleton (2): Well, that's the period of decay.
• 25:08
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, a few friars come and go, uh, but also the land, because it was a very powerful territory.
• 25:16
  Helena Hazleton (2): It was disputed by, by the Mexican governors that were assigning land grants for, for themselves.
• 25:23
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, Pio Pico, for example, sold a property of Mission San Luis Rey to his own brother.
• 25:29
  Damian Bacich: And Teópico was Mexican governor of California in the mid 1840s, up until the time of the U.
• 25:37
  Damian Bacich: S.
• 25:38
  Damian Bacich: occupation.
• 25:39
  Helena Hazleton (2): Mm hmm.
• 25:40
  Helena Hazleton (2): Mm hmm.
• 25:40
  Damian Bacich: Right.
• 25:41
  Damian Bacich: So, uh, so this was a time of decay.
• 25:45
  Damian Bacich: And then, so, uh, 1846, U.
• 25:50
  Damian Bacich: S., uh, the war breaks out between U.
• 25:52
  Damian Bacich: S.
• 25:52
  Damian Bacich: and Mexico, uh, the United States annexes Alta California, which then becomes, in 1850, the state of, of California.
• 26:04
  Damian Bacich: What happens?
• 26:06
  Damian Bacich: to the mission.
• 26:07
  Damian Bacich: It goes through a period of decay.
• 26:09
  Damian Bacich: Obviously, when you come now, it's not, it doesn't seem like it's in decay.
• 26:13
  Damian Bacich: I mean, it seems like an old place that needs, that sometimes needs refurbishing, but it looks beautiful.
• 26:19
  Damian Bacich: So what happened then to bring it to the state that it's in now?
• 26:26
  Helena Hazleton (2): Well, the mission was far from towns or pueblos that would have a community that can save the mission.
• 26:36
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, that leads to a period of complete abandonment, about 46 years of abandonment.
• 26:44
  Helena Hazleton (2): There was a nearby village, the San Luis Rey village, which was mostly a native village, but there were some pioneers that were part of the population as well.
• 26:55
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, we have a few ranches, um, that form from what used to be Mission San Luis Rey territory.
• 27:02
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, the Rancho Margarita and Las Flores become private ranches.
• 27:08
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, we have Rancho Guajome, Rancho Buena Vista, which is in the city of Vista today.
• 27:14
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, Rancho Monserrate, the city of Fallbrook.
• 27:18
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, all these ranches, um, just become a Farmers, ranchers, and employ the native population, while the building was abandoned and there was a period of decay, basically.
• 27:30
  Helena Hazleton (2): Uh, the building is, uh, When you have an abandoned building and you have nearby populations, you will see bricks being stolen, tiles being taken from the roof.
• 27:45
  Helena Hazleton (2): And little by little, the building starts just collapsing in ruins, basically.
• 27:52
  Helena Hazleton (2): There were some attempts to rescue valuable objects.
• 27:55
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, You might have heard of a woman originally from San Diego.
• 28:01
  Helena Hazleton (2): She was an immigrant from Mexico to Apolinaria Lorenzana.
• 28:08
  Helena Hazleton (2): She comes to the mission after Father Salvidea passed away.
• 28:15
  Helena Hazleton (2): So the last two resident priests at Mission San Luis Rey where Father Jose de Ibarra and Father Salvidea as well.
• 28:24
  Helena Hazleton (2): Father Salvidea is famous because he ministered for over 30 years at Mission San Gabriel.
• 28:32
  Helena Hazleton (2): He died actually here in Mission San Luis Rey and he is buried in this church.
• 28:36
  Helena Hazleton (2): So after he's dead, Apolinaria comes over to save paperwork, to save a few valuable objects.
• 28:44
  Helena Hazleton (2): They take the vestments to Mission Santa Barbara.
• 28:47
  Helena Hazleton (2): Uh, and the rest is just an abandoned building with nothing much to see.
• 28:52
  Helena Hazleton (2): Um, during the Mexican American War, the Mormon Battalion ends their, uh, their quest here at Mission San Luis Rey as well.
• 29:01
  Helena Hazleton (2): And they help just do land surveys, understand what is going on, uh, with the, uh, with the building.
• 29:09
  Helena Hazleton (2): Uh, but the Mormon Battalion also leaves after they're discharged.
• 29:13
  Helena Hazleton (2): And the mayor, Jean Baptiste Charbonneau, another thing that makes this mission special, the son of Sacagawea, was the first major of St.
• 29:21
  Helena Hazleton (2): Louis Rey in 1947.
• 29:23
  Helena Hazleton (2): He also ends up quitting because there was nothing to save.
• 29:27
  Helena Hazleton (2): And he, he had no power, no control over anything and he goes back north.
• 29:32
  Helena Hazleton (2): So the building is completely abandoned.
• 29:34
  Helena Hazleton (2): A few, uh, uh, surveyors just trying to establish maps come and goes.
• 29:41
  Helena Hazleton (2): And it is until, uh, about 1865.
• 29:46
  Helena Hazleton (2): When the leftover mission lands, it was about 60 acres of land, are granted back to the Catholic Church by Abraham Lincoln, only about three weeks, three and a half weeks before he was killed.
• 30:03
  Helena Hazleton (2): March 18th.
• 30:04
  Damian Bacich: In fact, if I recall correctly, in the museum, isn't there the document with Lincoln's signature where he returns the, the land to the Catholic Church?
• 30:17
  Damian Bacich: Is that right?
• 30:19
  Helena Hazleton (2): Yes, we have the document on display with Abraham Lincoln's signature.
• 30:32
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