 Mission San Luis Rey de Francia in July 2022 | |
  Location in California | |
| Location | 4050 Mission Ave. Oceanside, California 92057 USA |
|---|---|
| Coordinates | 33°13′57″N117°19′13″W / 33.23250°N 117.32028°W /33.23250; -117.32028 |
| Name as founded | La Misión de San Luis, Rey de Francia [1] |
| English translation | The Mission of Saint Louis, King of France |
| Patron | Louis IX of France[2] |
| Nickname(s) | "King of the Missions" [3] |
| Founding date | June 13, 1798[4] |
| Founding priest(s) | FatherFermín de Lasuén [5] |
| Area | 35 acres (14 ha) |
| Built | 1815 |
| Architectural style(s) | Spanish Colonial |
| Founding Order | Eighteenth[2] |
| Military district | First (El Presidio Reál de San Diego)[6][7] |
| Native tribe(s) Spanish name(s) | Kumeyaay,Quechnajuichom Luiseño &Diegueño 'Mission Indians' |
| Native place name(s) | Quencha—Quechla [8][9] |
| Baptisms | 5,399[10] |
| Marriages | 1,335[10] |
| Burials | 2,718[10] |
| Neophyte population | 2,788[11][12] |
| Secularized | 1834[2] |
| Returned to theChurch | 1865[2] |
| Governing body | Roman Catholic Diocese of San Diego |
| Current use | Parish/Museum/Cemetery/Retreat House |
| Official name: San Luis Rey Mission Church | |
| Designated | April 15, 1970[13] |
| Reference no. | 70000142[13] |
| Designated | April 15, 1970[14] |
| Reference no. | #239 |
| Website | |
| http://www.sanluisrey.org/ | |
Mission San Luis Rey de Francia (Spanish:Misión San Luis Rey de Francia) is a formerSpanish mission inSan Luis Rey, a neighborhood inOceanside, California. This Mission lent its name to theLuiseño tribe ofMission Indians.
At its prime, Mission San Luis Rey's structures and services compound covered almost 950,400 acres (384,600 ha), making it the largest of the Californian missions, along with its surrounding agricultural land.[15] Multiple outposts were built in support of Mission San Luis Rey and placed under its supervision, including theSan Antonio de Pala Asistencia in 1816 and theLas Flores Estancia in 1823.
The full name of the mission isLa Misión de San Luis, Rey de Francia (The Mission of Saint Louis, King of France). It was named for KingLouis IX of France.[1][2] Its nickname is "King of the Missions".[3] It was founded by padreFermín Lasuén on June 12, 1798, the eighteenth of the twenty-oneSpanish missions built in theAlta California Province of theViceroyalty of New Spain.[2][4][5] In 1800,Mission olive trees were first planted at the Mission; by 1876, only seven of the mission's olive trees were alive.[16]
The current church, built in 1815, is the third church on this location.[17] It is aNational Historic Landmark, for its pristine example of a Spanish mission church complex.[14][18][19] Today the mission complex functions as aparish church of theDiocese of San Diego as well as a museum and retreat center. Mission San Luis Rey De Francia raised about 26,000 cattle as well as goats, geese, and pigs.
An early account of life at the Mission was written by one of itsNative Americanconverts,LuiseñoPablo Tac, in his workIndian Life and Customs at Mission San Luis Rey: A Record of California Mission Life by Pablo Tac, An Indian Neophyte (writtenc. 1835 inRome, later edited and translated in 1958 by Minna Hewes and Gordon Hewes).[20] In his book, Tac lamented the rapidpopulation decline of his Luiseño people after the founding of the mission:
In Quechla not long ago there were 5,000 souls, with all their neighboring lands. Through a sickness that came to California, 2,000 souls died, and 3,000 were left.[9]
The Mission-born,Franciscan-educated Tac wrote that his people initially attempted to bar the Spaniards from invading theirSouthern California lands. Pablo Tac went on to describe the preferential conditions and treatment the padres received:
In the mission of San Luis Rey de Francia the Fernandino [sic] father is like a king. He has his pages, alcaldes, majordomos, musicians, soldiers, gardens, ranchos, livestock....[21]
The first Peruvian Pepper Tree (Schinus molle) in California was planted here in 1830, now iconic, widely planted, and renamed theCalifornia Pepper tree in the state. After theMexican secularization act of 1833 much of Mission San Luis Rey de Francia land was sold off. Indigenous peoples, previously forced to work on missions, were freed from direct subjugation in the mission system through this act. When Native people at San Luis Rey learned of their impending freedom, they proclaimed together: "We are free! We do not want to obey! We do not want to work!" and left the mission by the thousands, returning to their rural communities "which in some cases their forebears had left two generations earlier."[22]
During theMexican–American War inAlta California (1846–1847), the Mission was utilized as a military outpost by theUnited States Army.[15] In July 1847, U.S.military governor of CaliforniaRichard Barnes Mason created an Indian sub-agency at Mission San Luis Rey, and his men took charge of the mission property in August, appointing Jesse Hunter from the recently arrivedMormon Battalion as sub-agent. Battalion guideJean Baptiste Charbonneau, theNative AmericanShoshone child ofSacagawea who had traveled with theLewis and Clark Expedition forty years earlier, was appointed by Mason as theAlcalde "within the District of San Diego, at or near San Luis Rey" in November 1847. Charbonneau resigned from the post in August, 1848, claiming that "because of his Indian heritage others thought him biased when problems arose between the Indians and the other inhabitants of the district."[23]
Withsecularization of the mission in 1834, no religious services were held and theLuiseño were left behind by the fleeingFranciscan padres. The Mission's religious services restarted in 1893, when twoMexican priests were given permission to restore the Mission as a Franciscan college.[15] Father Joseph O'Keefe was assigned as an interpreter for the monks. It was he who began to restore the old Mission in 1895. Thecuadrángulo (quadrangle) and church were completed in 1905.San Luis Rey College was opened as aseminary in 1950, but closed in 1969.
Episodes 2, 3, 4 and 12 of theDisney-producedZorro TV series include scenes filmed in 1957 at San Luis Rey,[24] which doubled for theMission of San Gabriel. Disney added a skull and crossbones to the cemetery entrance.
In 1998,Gilbert Levine led members of theLos Angeles Philharmonic and, with the special permission ofPope John Paul II, the ancientCappella Giulia Choir ofSt. Peter's Basilica, the first-ever visit of this 500-year-old choir to theWestern Hemisphere, in a series of concerts to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the founding of the mission, broadcast onNPR'sPerformance Today. In February 2013, theseismic retrofitting was completed.[25]
Today, Mission San Luis Rey de Francia is a working mission, cared for by the people who belong to the parish, with ongoing restoration projects. Mission San Luis Rey has a Museum, Visitors' Center, Retreat Center,[26] gardens with the historic Pepper Tree, and the original small cemetery.[27][28][29]
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