Capistrano Mission

A California Mission of Triumph and Tragedy

Not long after our Declaration of Independence was signed, Fray Junipero Serra stood upon the earth of Southern California and deemed it the site for a new mission. It proved one of the most beautiful of the chain of 21 religious communities, named for a Franciscan friar, St. John Capistrano, who lived in the time of the crusades. Dedicated November 1, 1776, it inspired the popular song, When The Swallows Come Back to Capistrano and many novels of early California are set in its environs.

The tale of the seventh mission is one of triumph and tragedy. There the Franciscan padres developed a solid relationship with their community of very willing Juane'o Indians, whose tribe was renamed after the mission itself. They decided that the church at Capistrano, located seventy-five miles north of San Diego would be the site of the most magnificent of all California mission churches.

It would be built of stone, because there were structural limits to adobe construction which required unusually thick walls to reach the desired heights. Block by block the padres guided the Indians who quarried the stone and hauled it nine miles to the mission site. This was no small task but all longed to see their magnificent church become as immortal as the stone cathedrals of Mexico and Spain.

Work began in 1797 and continued over thirty years until 1806 when the structure was completed. It measured 180 feet long and 85 feet wide, with graceful Old World domes and arches. But in 1812, as though God punished this mission community for the sin of pride in such a grandees structure, a massive earthquake rocked the Pacific Coast. Damage was recorded at San Gabriel Mission, San Buena Ventura, and Purissima, but the greatest loss was the complete devastation of the great stone church at Capistrano. Its domes and arches collapsed killing forty Indians attending services inside. Today their bodies rest in a small graveyard beside the church, and its ruins were never rebuilt, and to this day are further reroding and now surrounded by scaffolding for temporary support until massive internal structural reinforcements are constructed. All that remains of this classical Greco-Roman architecture are a few walls which inspired the popular name, "The American Acropolis".

Despite the loss of the main church, there remains more to appreciate at San Juan Capistrano than at any other mission site. The Serra Chapel, a smaller church built in 1776-78 is in fact the oldest building in California. Few places evoke the deep sense of the sacred as this narrow chapel, for the ornate Baroque altar piece is completely leafed in gold and was shipped all the way from Spain via galleon. Along the walls hang oil paintings saints and religious scenes, their surfaces darkened by over 200 years of candle soot. The contrast of elaborate Old World art combined with primitive hand hewn beams and oyster-shell plasters defines the atmosphere of all the existing mission churches of Spanish California.

San Juan Capistrano is also the most gardenesque of all the missions. Though the old church is still in ruins, the remaining structures are in a remarkable state of preservation and show the original layout of the site. The central courtyard is surrounded on all sides by traditional mission buildings composed of a simple row of rooms connected by a common veranda that provided comfortable living space during very hot or rainy weather. In the European monastic tradition of the Franciscans, these are called cloisters, where the monks would walk and say their daily prayers.

In mission times this courtyard was the center of activity because the central fountain, called the Fountain of the Four Evangelists, provided fresh water for the entire community. It was also a place for local vaqueros to demonstrate their horsemanship and roping skills, as both were essential to the ranching industry surrounding the livestock first brought to California by the missionaries. The Indians climbed up onto the tile roofs over the cloisters as though they were grandstands to get a better view of both entertainment and religious processions.

Today Capistrano mission has become a historic garden, planted in verdant lawns, and shaded by the most popular tree species of all the missions, California peppers. The seeds of the first peppers originated in Peru and were brought to the missions by padres en route around the horn to the Pacific coast. Along the arched cloisters stand a garden of cacti and prickly pear, plus many drought tolerant species that were grown during mission times. Even roses fill this lovely place, growing as they did a century ago to remind the padres of the old European species with their heavy musk and vivid color.