Tumacacori National Historical Park
- Sheryl Linn
- Mar 24, 2022
- 2 min read
Updated: May 9, 2023
On our "date day" this week, Roger and I went to Tumacacori National Historical Park. This mission began in the 1700s and is located forty-five miles south of Tucson, Arizona, and eighteen miles north of Nogales, Arizona. The photo caption information I'm sharing is taken from the map and key given to tourists at the Visitor's Station. For more information and the history of the church check out: https://www.nps.gov/tuma/learn/historyculture/the-church.htm
The front of the church was brightly painted. The columns were red and the Egyptian-style capitals were yellow with black markings. The statue niches were blue. You can still see holes in the bell tower where scaffolding was built into the walls during construction.
There were no pews or side chapels; the church is in the form of a long hall. Lining the walls are four side altars where devotional candles could be placed. Statues of saints stood in the niches above. Roger is standing back in the sanctuary. The sanctuary was protected by a domed ceiling made of fired adobes.
The mission had a communal system of growing and distributing food. This two-story storeroom was used for storage and distribution. The best seeds from each harvest of grain, beans, and fruit were stored in large clay pots located in the storeroom.
The Convento Complex was an open square of buildings with a central courtyard that was a focus of community life. This remaining fragment of the complex includes the rooms in which the priest likely resided.
This outline marks the footprint of a church that was in use in 1757. The Jesuit priests used this small church until their expulsion in July 1767. A year later, Franciscans arrive to care for the mission. They used this church until the new one was ready for use in 1822.
Here, limestone rocks were heated then pounded into a fine powder used to make lime mortar and plaster. It was the best protection possible for sun-dried adobe.
This is a modern construction of a traditional O'odham dwelling, made of mesquite timbers, saguaro ribs, ocotillo sticks, and mud. It was built in 1997 by O'odham from the San Xavier community using traditional hand tools.
The first burial took place here in 1822. The fourteen niches in the walls held paintings or sculptures of the Catholic "stations of the cross". Family might spend time with their deceased loved ones inside the round mortuary chapel.
