The California missions
Twenty-one missions, and a population down by two-thirds
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A mission was a church with farmland and workshops around it, where Indigenous people were to be converted to Christianity and trained in European working life. California's Indigenous population fell from around 310,000 to under 100,000 during the mission period, before the Gold Rush made it worse. The missions are at the same time the basis of the state's geography — San Diego, Los Angeles, San Francisco and San Jose are where they are because of them, and El Camino Real joins them. The canonisation of Junípero Serra in 2015 drew strong opposition from Californian Indigenous communities, and several statues of him have since been removed.
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The Spanish built a chain of missions along the California coast. Indigenous people were gathered there to be made Christian and to work the land. They were not free to leave, and disease spread quickly in the crowded settlements.
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