Bonjour! This week’s carte postale features Mission San Juan Bautista, located about 92 miles/ 148 km south of San Francisco, California.
- Founded in June 24, 1797, Mission San Juan Bautista (St. John the Baptist) is the 15th of 21 California Missions along El Camino Real
- The mission has three naves, making San Juan Bautista the largest of all the California Missions
- Alfred Hitchcock filmed crucial scenes of his 1958 movie, Vertigo, at Mission San Juan Bautista and its surrounding areas (The film was based on the 1954 French novel, D’entre les morts by Boileau & Narcejac)
For more information:
Gilroy Dispatch (2007)
Until the next Wednesday Postcard, stay safe!
Bonjour: A Francophile Blog 
California’s mission history is severely underrepresented, and it’s a shame, because such buildings are one of the oldest on the West Coast, some dating back to the 18th century. I appreciate you illuminating the beauty of such missions in your post. California represent!
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Thank you! I heard that many California schools no longer require 4th graders to make a model of a mission. Instead, they’re focusing on Native Americans’ everyday life at the mission. Not sure whether 9-year-olds can handle the truth: Native Americans endured brutal treatment while they were being converted to Catholicism!
I think it’s good that the missions were restored or reconstructed. That way, we’ll remember this part of history that shaped California.
So far, I’ve been to 12 missions, including Mission Dolores, where I was baptized. I would love to visit the ones in SoCal.
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