STUDY QUESTIONS

CALIFORNIA:  AN INTERPRETIVE HISTORY (8th Ed.)

CHAPTER 4  -  OUTPOSTS OF A DYING EMPIRE

1. Father Serra wanted to increase the number of missions, but Spanish officials in California resisted this.  Why?
2. How many missions were ultimately established in the state?
3. What motivated Spain in the 1770s to take more interest in Alta California?
4. Who was Captain Juan Batista de Anza and what did he propose and accomplish in 1774 and 1775?
5. Who were the pobladores (populators) and why did they settle in California?
6. What was the crux of the dispute between the missions and the governors as to the function of the missions?
7. What was Governor Felipe de Neve's solution to solving the food supply problems of the presidios?  How was this related  to the founding of Los Angeles?
8. Who were the first settlers of Los Angeles?  Is "the city of the Angels" an accurate translation of the Spanish name given to the pueblo?
9. How did Native Americans respond to the missions?  What forms did resistance take?
10. Besides the loss of life, why was the Yuma Massacre in 1781 such a tragedy from the Spanish perspective?
11. How did views of the missions by early visitors to Spanish California contrast with each other?
12. How do modern day historians such as Rawls and Bean view the mission system?
13. What were the racial foundations in the Spanish division of the colonial population into "rationals" and "irrationals?"
14. Very few California Indian views have entered the historical record, but we do hear Bartolomea's (aka Victoria) view.  What was her impression of the missions?
15. How was the impact of the missions on California Native American women especially severe?
16. What contributed to the high death rate of Native Americans within the mission system?
17. What was the essential purpose of the Russian settlement at Fort Ross, and why didn't the Spanish force the Russian traders out of Northern California?
18. As Spain's power decreased and Mexico entered independence, why were California settlers becoming more resentful of the missions?

Key Names, Terms and Concepts