"the last 20M people in California have on average changed the demographics of CA"
So did the first 20 million.
The native peoples did not thrive during the mission period and the death toll was exorbitant. In the brief span of 65 years of mission operation, extending from the first founding (1769) to the secularization on the missions (1834), 81,000 Indians were baptized in the missions, and 60,000 deaths were recorded. Causes for the high death rate varied. Foremost were the European diseases (smallpox, measles, diptheria) against which the Indians had no natural immunity. Additional causes include a diet high in carbohydrates, but low in vegetables and animal protein, working conditions, harsh life-styles imposed by the missionaries, and poor sanitation and health care. Native health care practioners were prohibited from employing their skills and knowledge and at night the Indians were forced to sleep in dank, dark dormitories. Thomas Farnham, an early Anglo-American visitor to Mission Santa Barbara, was repelled by the evidence of massive death he found there. He noted the mission cemetery was so filled with dead Indians that their bones had to be exhumed periodically to make way for new bodies. In the mission's courtyard he saw
three or four cart-loads of skulls, ribs, spines, leg-bones, arm-bones, etc., lay in one corner. Beside them stood two hand-hearses with a small cross attached to each. About the walls hung the mould of death!
Similar scenes could be witnessed at most of the other missions. By 1834 there remained about 15,000 resident neophytes in the 21 missions. Missionization had been an unmitigated disaster for the Native Californians.
cabrillo.edu |
