"Not the wildest conceptions of the mission founders could have foreseen the results of their California enterprises," says Professor George Wharton James in his interesting work on these old missions.[3] "To see the land they found in the possession of thousands of savages converted in one short century, to the home of tens of thousands of happy, contented people, would have been a wild vision indeed. God surely does work mysteriously, marvellously, His wonders to perform."
Santa Fé is the centre of the archdiocese whose other diocesean cities are Denver and Tucson. The archbishop, the Most Reverend J. B. Salpointe, D.D., whose presence exalts the city of his residence, is one who follows reverently in the footsteps of Him whose kingdom on earth the early Franciscans labored to establish.
In 1708 San Miguel was restored by Governor José Chacon Medina Salazar y Villaseñor, Marqués de Peñuela, and two years later these restorations were completed. An inscription that can be traced to-day on the gallery bears this legend:
El Señor Marqués de la Peñuela Hizo Esta Fábrica: El Alférez real Don Augustin Flores Vergara su criado. Año de 1710.
SAN MIGUEL CHURCH, SANTA FÉ
Not only is this "City of the Holy Faith" consecrated by that sacrificial devotion of the Franciscan Fathers; the heroic explorers and pioneers, the brave and dauntless soldiers, from the time of Cabeza de Vaca and Coronado to that of the gallant and noble General Kearny, have left on Santa Fé the impress of their brave purpose and high endeavor. The old Cathedral of San Francisco, the ancient church of San Miguel, and the Rosario Chapel, all interest the stranger. In 1692 Diego de Vargas marched up from the south with two hundred men and looked sadly at the little town of Santa Fé, from which his countrymen had been driven. It would seem that de Vargas was a romantic figure of his time. He was evidently endowed with the characteristic vehemence of temperament, intense energy, and the genius for effective action that marked the Spanish pioneers. He was rich in resources and manifested a power of swift decision regarding all the perplexities into which his adventurous life led, ever beckoning him on. The little town he had entered appealed to him in its impressive beauty. Surrounded with majestic mountains, with their deep and mysterious cañons, it was then, as now, a region of entrancing sublimity.
Adjoining San Miguel is the old house where Coronado is said to have lodged in 1540. The "Old Palace," always used by the Governors of New Mexico, is partly given over to a museum of Indian and Mexican curiosities. There is a little library, open only every other afternoon; there are many mountain peaks around, which are not difficult to climb, and which offer charming views. The new State House is a fine modern building, and Governor Hagerman, formerly an attaché of the American Embassy at St. Petersburg, is alert and progressive in his methods.
More than half the residents of Santa Fé speak no English, and these Spanish and Mexican residents have their papers in their own language, their separate schools, and their worship in the old Cathedral. In the early afternoon women in black, with black mantillas over their heads, are seen passing up San Francisco Street and entering the Cathedral, where they fall on their knees and tell their beads in the silent church. Often one may see in the streets a funeral procession. The casket is carried in a cart, and the family sit around it, on the bottom of the wagon. A few friends follow on foot, and thus the pathetic and grotesque little procession winds on its way.
The history lying in the dim background of this ancient Spanish city is one that impresses the imagination. It is a part of all that wonderful early exploration by the Spanish pioneers of the vast region of country that is now known as Arizona and New Mexico.