Mission San Luis Rey de Francia () is a former Spanish mission in San Luis Rey, a neighborhood in Oceanside, California. This Mission lent its name to the Luiseño tribe of Mission Indians.

At its prime, Mission San Luis Rey's structures and services compound covered almost , making it the largest of the Californian missions, along with its surrounding agricultural land.

The current church, built in 1815, is the third church on this location. It is a National Historic Landmark, for its pristine example of a Spanish mission church complex. Today the mission complex functions as a parish church of the Diocese 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 its Native American converts, Luiseño Pablo Tac, in his work Indian Life and Customs at Mission San Luis Rey: A Record of California Mission Life by Pablo Tac, An Indian Neophyte (written in Rome, later edited and translated in 1958 by Minna Hewes and Gordon Hewes). In his book, Tac lamented the rapid population decline of his Luiseño people after the founding of the mission:

<blockquote>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.</blockquote>

Mexican era

thumb|left|[[Luiseños refusing to work for Captain Pablo de la Portillà in 1835.]]

The first Peruvian Pepper Tree (Schinus molle) in California was planted here in 1830, now iconic, widely planted, and renamed the California Pepper tree in the state. After the Mexican 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."

During the Mexican–American War in Alta California (1846–1847), the Mission was utilized as a military outpost by the United States Army.

American era

thumb|left|The courtyard of Mission San Luis Rey de Francia, with the first Peruvian Pepper Tree ([[Schinus molle) planted in California in 1830, visible behind the arch. Father Joseph O'Keefe was assigned as an interpreter for the monks. It was he who began to restore the old Mission in 1895. The cuadrángulo (quadrangle) and church were completed in 1905. San Luis Rey College was opened as a seminary in 1950, but closed in 1969.

Episodes 2, 3, 4 and 12 of the Disney-produced Zorro TV series include scenes filmed in 1957 at San Luis Rey, which doubled for the Mission of San Gabriel. Disney added a skull and crossbones to the cemetery entrance.

In 1998, Gilbert Levine led members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic and, with the special permission of Pope John Paul II, the ancient Cappella Giulia Choir of St. Peter's Basilica, the first-ever visit of this 500-year-old choir to the Western Hemisphere, in a series of concerts to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the founding of the mission, broadcast on NPR's Performance Today. In February 2013, the seismic retrofitting was completed.

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, gardens with the historic Pepper Tree, and the original small cemetery.

See also

thumb|The courtyard of the mission

thumb|right|Mission San Luis Rey de Francia as it appeared in 1986. In 1841, [[France|French explorer Eugene Duflot de Mofras produced a sketch of the Mission that depicted a second belfry, thereby supporting the theory that two bell towers were planned, but never completed; the lone tower was also used as a lookout post.]]

thumb|Old Cemetery - founded in 1798

  • Spanish missions in California
  • List of Spanish missions in California
  • Las Flores Asistencia
  • Mission San Antonio de Pala
  • Luiseño – Mission Indians
  • Population of Native California
  • California mission clash of cultures
  • USNS Mission San Luis Rey (AO-128) – a Buenaventura Class fleet oiler launched during World War II.

Notes

References

  • Official Mission San Luis Rey website
  • Official Mission San Luis Rey parish website
  • Open Access teaching unit on Pablo Tac's account of the conversion of the Saluiseños, in English and Spanish versions
  • Calisphere – California Digital Library: Early photographs, sketches, and land surveys of Mission San Luis Rey de Francia.
  • Elevation & Site Layout sketches of the Mission compound
  • Satellite image from Google Maps
  • Early History of the California Coast, a National Park Service Discover Our Shared Heritage Travel Itinerary
  • Mission San Luis Rey – Pictures, videos and history
  • Mission San Luis Rey Cemetery at Find a Grave