Mission San José de Tumacácori

Mission San José de Tumacácori is a historic Spanish mission near Nogales, Arizona, preserved in its present form by Franciscans in 1828.

History
Mission San Cayetano del Tumacácori was established by Jesuits in 1691 in a location near a Sobaipuri settlement on the east side of the Santa Cruz River. Services were held in a small adobe structure built by the inhabitants of the village.

After the O'odham rebellion of 1751 the mission was abandoned for a time. In 1752, the village was reestablished and in 1753 the church of the Mission San José de Tumacácori began construction at the present site on the west side of the Santa Cruz River. This first church structure was erected for use by the mission in 1757. The architectural style of the church is Spanish Colonial.

Rumors spread within the Spanish kingdom that the Jesuit priests had amassed a fortune on the peninsula and were becoming very powerful. On February 3, 1768 King Carlos III ordered the Jesuits forcibly expelled from the Viceroyalty of New Spain (colonial México) and returned to Spain. They were replaced by Franciscan missionaries.

Alejo García Conde, intendant-governor of Arizpe, officially granted the mission land to the resident O'odham in response to an 1806 petition. The initial grant, made on December 17, 1806, included a fundo legal and an estancia. A series of interviews with natives and legal decisions in 1807 clarified and extended the boundaries of the mission.

The deed to Tumacácori was lost in 1841. The mission was declared abandoned in 1843, and accordingly auctioned in 1844. Francisco Alejandro de Aguilar purchased it for five hundred pesos, on behalf of his brother-in-law, Manuel María Gándara. A small O'odham community continued to live and farm on the mission, until an 1848 Apache attack killed nine of them and the survivors abandoned the site.

The mission is now part of the 360 acre of Tumacácori National Historical Park, which contains three separate sections and is open to the public daily.

Missionaries
Like most missions in New Spain, Tumacácori was staffed by Jesuit missionaries until the 1768 Jesuit expulsion from Mexico, and Franciscan missionaries afterwards.


 * Narciso Gutiérrez (1794–1820)
 * Juan Bautista Estelric
 * Ramón Liberós

Historic Mission San José de Tumacácori gallery
These are images of the inside of the Tumacacori Mission and of the Cemetery grounds.

Additional references

 * Di Peso, Charles C., 1956; The Upper Pima of San Cayetano del Tumacacori: An Archaeohistorical Reconstruction of the Ootam of Pimeria Alta.  The Amerind Foundation, Inc. Dragoon, Arizona.
 * Dobyns, Henry F., 1959; Tubac Through Four Centuries: A Historical Resume and Analysis. Prepared for the Arizona State Parks Board 15 March 1959, Reformatted by Tubac Presidio State Historical Park August 1995 and revised. Available on line at: http://parentseyes.arizona.edu/tubac/index.html
 * Doyel, D. E., 1977 Excavations in the Middle Santa Cruz River Valley, Southeastern Arizona. Contribution to Highway Salvage Archaeology in Arizona, Number 44. Arizona State Museum, University of Arizona, Tucson.
 * Fratt, Lee, 1981; Tumacacori Plaza Excavation, 1979: Historical Archaeology at Tumacacori National Monument, Arizona. Publications in Anthropology 16. Tucson, AZ: Western Archaeological and Conservation Center, National Park Service.
 * Seymour, Deni J., 1993; "Piman Settlement Survey in the Middle Santa Cruz River Valley, Santa Cruz County, Arizona." Report submitted to Arizona State Parks in fulfillment of survey and planning grant contract requirements.
 * Seymour, Deni J., 2007a; "Delicate Diplomacy on a Restless Frontier: Seventeenth-Century Sobaípuri Social And Economic Relations in Northwestern New Spain, Part I." New Mexico Historical Review, Volume 82, no. 4.
 * Seymour, Deni J., 2008; "Delicate Diplomacy on a Restless Frontier: Seventeenth-Century Sobaípuri Social And Economic Relations in Northwestern New Spain, Part II." New Mexico Historical Review, Volume 83, no. 2.
 * Seymour, Deni J., 2007b; "A Syndetic Approach to Identification of the Historic Mission Site of San Cayetano del Tumacácori." International Journal of Historical Archaeology, Vol. 11(3):269–296.