Perceptions of the Missions over Time.
Since the nineteenth century, the California Missions have been depicted in the words of writers and explorers and in the images of artists. These depictions have ranged from the romanticized to the historical to the purely negative and often reflect changing trends in public thinking about the Missions. At different times the Missions have been seen as desolate ruins, exotic records of a conquered culture, or romantic remains of a bygone era. Consider the following varying perspectives:

"A more desolate place cannot be well imagined. The old adobe church is partially in ruins, and the adobe huts built for the Indians are roofless, and the walls tumbled about in shapeless piles." -J. Ross Browne, reporter, federal government employee, and world traveler, describing Mission Soledad, 1846

"Dreamy and dutiful daughter of sunny Spain.with neither regret for yesterday nor care for tomorrow, the Southern California of a quarter of a century ago enjoyed its perennial siesta.Between its sleepy Spanish past and its sleepless American present, few links remain. Practically the sole staunch survivors of those old days of romance are the venerable Missions." From "Those Old Missions," by Charles Lummis, Los Angeles Times, 1888.

The Missions were "like palaces, and.there were thousands of Indians in every one of them; thousands and thousands, all working so happy and peaceful." -Spoken by the character Ramona in the best-selling novel Ramona, by Helen Hunt Jackson, 1884.

Tell us what you think about the California Missions.
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