Mission Santa Inés

Mission Santa Inés

Mission Santa Inés in 2005. The original bell structure (erected in 1817) collapsed in 1911 and was reconstructed out of reinforced concrete in 1948. The campanile has been compared by architectural historian Rexford Newcomb to the one that originally abutted the façade of Mission San Gabriel Arcángel.
Location	1760 Mission Drive, Solvang, California
Name as founded	La Misión de Nuestra Santa Inés, Virgen y Mártir [1]
English translation	The Mission of Saint Agnes of Rome, Virgin and Martyr
Patron	Saint Agnes of Rome [2]
Nickname(s)	"Hidden Gem of the Missions" [3]
Founding date	September 17, 1804 [4]
Founding priest(s)	Father Presidente Pedro Estévan Tápis [5]
Founding Order	Nineteenth [2]
Military district	Second [6]
Native tribe(s) Spanish name(s)	Chumash Inéseño
Native place name(s)	'Alahulapu [7]
Baptisms	1,348 [8]
Marriages	400 [8]
Burials	1,227 [8]
Secularized	1836 [2]
Returned to the Church	1862 [2]
Governing body	Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles
Current use	Parish Church / Museum
Coordinates	34°35′40.1604″N 120°08′11.7702″W / 34.594489°N 120.136602833°W / 34.594489; -120.136602833
National Historic Landmark	#NPS-99000630[9]
California Historical Landmark	#305
Website	http://www.missionsantaines.org

Mission Santa Inés (sometimes spelled Santa Ynez) was founded on September 17, 1804 by Father Estévan Tapís, who had succeeded Father Fermín Lasuén as President of the California mission chain. The Mission site was chosen as a midway point between Mission Santa Barbara and Mission La Purísima Concepción, and was designed to relieve overcrowding at those two missions and to serve the Indians living east of the Coast Range. Despite its name, the Mission is located at 1760 Mission Drive, Solvang, California.

The Mission was home to the first learning institution in Alta California.^[5]

History

Most of the original church was destroyed on December 21, 1812 in an earthquake centered near Santa Barbara that damaged or destroyed most of California's missions. The quake also severely damaged other Mission buildings, but the complex was not abandoned. A new church, constructed with 5-to-6-foot-thick (1.5 to 1.8 m) walls and great pine beams brought from nearby Figueroa Mountain, was dedicated on July 4, 1817.

On February 21, 1824 a soldier beat a young Chumash Indian and sparked a revolt. Some of the Indians went to get the Indians from Missions Santa Barbara and La Purísima to help in the fight. When the fighting was over, the Indians themselves put out the fire that had started at the Mission. Many of the Indians left to join other tribes in the mountains; only a few Indians remained at the Mission.

In 1833 the missions in California were secularized, and their land given in land grants to settlers.

Highwayman Jack Powers briefly took over Mission Santa Inés and the adjacent Rancho San Marcos in 1853, intending to rustle the cattle belonging to rancher Nicolas A. Den, but he was defeated in a bloodless armed confrontation. He was not to be ousted from the Santa Barbara area until 1855.

In 1843, California's Mexican governor granted 34,499 acres (139.61 km²) of Santa Ynez Valley land to the first Bishop of California, who established at the Mission the College of Our Lady of Refuge, the first seminary in California. The college was abandoned in 1881; by then the Mission was disintegrating. A family lived there in the 1890s and did some repairs, but much of the complex collapsed in 1894.

The Danish town of Solvang was built up around the Mission proper in the early 1900s. It was through the efforts of Father Alexander Buckler in 1904 that reconstruction of the Mission was undertaken, though major restoration was not possible until 1947 when the Hearst Foundation donated money to pay the for project. The restoration continues to this day, and the Capuchin Franciscan Fathers take excellent care of the Mission. Today the Mission is an active parish; there is also a museum, gift shop and information center.

Notes

1. ^ Leffingwell, p. 71
2. ^ ^{a b c d} Krell, p. 286
3. ^ Ruscin, p. 163
4. ^ Yenne, p. 164
5. ^ ^{a b} Ruscin, p. 196
6. ^ Forbes, p. 202
7. ^ Ruscin, p. 195
8. ^ ^{a b c} Krell, p. 315: as of December 31, 1832; information adapted from Engelhardt's Missions and Missionaries of California.
9. ^ NHL Admission

See also

• USNS Mission Santa Ynez (AO-134) — a Mission Buenaventura Class fleet oiler built during World War II.

References

• Forbes, Alexander (1839). California: A History of Upper and Lower California. Smith, Elder and Co., Cornhill, London. 
• Krell, Dorothy (ed.) (1979). The California Missions: A Pictorial History. Sunset Publishing Corporation, Menlo Park, CA. ISBN 0-376-05172-8. 
• Jones, Terry L. and Kathryn A. Klar (eds.) (2007). California Prehistory: Colonization, Culture, and Complexity. Altimira Press, Landham, MD. ISBN 0-759-10872-2. 
• Leffingwell, Randy (2005). California Missions and Presidios: The History & Beauty of the Spanish Missions. Voyageur Press, Inc., Stillwater, MN. ISBN 0-89658-492-5. 
• Paddison, Joshua (ed.) (1999). A World Transformed: Firsthand Accounts of California Before the Gold Rush. Heyday Books, Berkeley, CA. ISBN 1-890771-13-9. 
• Ruscin, Terry (1999). Mission Memoirs. Sunbelt Publications, San Diego, CA. ISBN 0-932653-30-8. 
• Yenne, Bill (2004). The Missions of California. Thunder Bay Press, San Diego, CA. ISBN 1-59223-319-8. 

External links

Mission Santa Inés and its original four-bell campanile ("bell tower"), circa 1900.

• Early photographs, sketches, land surveys of Mission Santa Inés, via Calisphere, California Digital Library
• Elevation & Site Layout sketches of the Mission proper