DUANE
Get the App
Duane's take
The way the official marker tells it, here's the story of Mission San Francisco Xavier de Najera. Now, some missions leave you a long chapter. This one leaves you something closer to a footnote, but don't let that fool you.
A short story can still carry some weight. The mission was established in 1722. Four years.
That's all it got before things shifted. By 1726, the Indian neophytes there, few in number the marker is careful to say, passed into the care of the missionaries at San Antonio de Valero. Just like that, a congregation folded into a larger one, and the mission that had gathered them went quiet.
But the land didn't just sit there forgotten. It was later granted to the Mission Nuestra Senora de la Purisima Conception de Acunia. One mission's ending becoming another mission's foundation, in a manner of speaking.
And then, as if the story wasn't quite finished, Mission San Francisco Xavier de Najera was reestablished in this very vicinity in 1731. Not every place gets a second chapter. This one did.
What the marker says
Established in 1722. Its Indian neophytes, few in number, passed into the care of the missionaries at San Antonio de Valero in 1726. The land was later granted to the Mission Nuestra Senora De la Purisima Conception De Acunia. Reestablished in this vicinity in 1731.