Baja California and Its Missions. By Tomas Robertson.
Glendale: La Siesta Press, 1978. Bibliography. Illustrations. Maps. Appendix. 96
pages. $3.50
Reviewed by R. Coke Wood, Director Emeritus, Holt-Atherton
Pacific Center for Western Studies, University of Pacific, Stockton, California;
who directed fourteen annual tours to the Franciscan Missions.
Author Tomas Robertson has spent over fifty years roaming
Baja California and exploring it by foot, horseback, auto or by boats along the shore. He
has a love for it due to this familiarity and speaks of it as an old friend.
Two years ago the idea came to him to explore the mission
sites-Jesuit, Franciscan and Dominican-and write something of their history as a
part of his duties as president of the committee for conservation of these
missions. This excellent paperback history of these missions, their location
and a description of the remains has resulted.
Anyone who is interested in the significant history of Baja
California, its similarity and yet its difference should purchase this study of
the Missions of Baja California. Much of the significant history of the
peninsula occurred at the missions or in the process of establishing them.
Author Robertson gives much of the background history for each of the three
eras of mission founding and, therefore, this booklet is a good history of Baja
California. It certainly will be of value to anyone who is studying the
twenty-one Franciscan Missions in Alta California.
