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Two Padres started the Mission at Santa
Cruz. (In the Catholic Church, the priests are called "Fathers," and Padre is
the Spanish word for Father.) The two Padres were named Alonzo Salazar and
Baldomero Lopez, and they kept diaries of what happened, so we know quite a bit
about them.
And what did they do when they
arrived at the place we now call Santa Cruz? Well, they put up a tent
beside a hill, the very hill where the Mission Santa Cruz now
stands. They wanted their mission to be close to the river, so
that they could have water to drink and for watering their crops.
If it sounds funny to you, to think of two priests putting up a tent, you have to remember what it was like back then. There were no buildings and no streets like there are today. The closest neighbors they had were many miles away in Santa Clara and Monterey. They must have felt very lonely, and perhaps a little afraid, camping beside that beautiful hill.
Of course, they had brought supplies with
them, because there weren't any grocery stores where they could buy food.
The Mission at Santa Clara gave them cows and horses and oxen. The Mission
at Carmel gave them seven mules. The Mission at San Francisco gave them
sixty sheep 
and ten rams and two bushels of barley, which is a kind
of a grain. You can see what barley looks like by clicking on the picture
to make it bigger.
You can imagine what a racket they probably made, coming into that peaceful valley with all of the cows mooing and the sheep bleating. They must have been very busy those first few days building pens and clearing away trees to make pastures.
Even with all of those animals, the Padres
almost ran out of food. They had to buy beans and corn from 
the soldiers, and they paid them 42 dollars for it.
Do you know what else they bought from the soldiers? Chocolate. One
of them must have had a sweet tooth.
The Padres worked very hard, and the first Mission at Santa Cruz was dedicated on September 25, 1791. If you want to do a little math, you'll see that the Mission at Santa Cruz will be 209 years old in the year 2,000.
Would you like to see how they built the Mission? If you would, just click on the bell, and we'll tell you.
