Mission San Juan

Mission San Juan Capistrano is distinguished by its white limestone-plastered church, which stands in marked contrast to the darker stone of the surrounding historic structures. Established by Franciscan friars on the east bank of the San Antonio River in seventeen thirty-one, the site began its life as a mission founded fifteen years earlier in East Texas. When it relocated here, the community transformed into a self-sustaining agricultural hub, with indigenous farmers tending irrigated fields of maize, peppers, and beans while herds of thousands of sheep and cattle grazed the nearby plains.