Made in the 1940s by Phi E. Cantonwine, “Bells of the Past” takes a charming and idealized look at California’s missions. The legacy of Father Junipero Serra is discussed.
The Spanish missions in California comprise a series of 21 religious outposts; established by Catholic priests of the Franciscan order between 1769 and 1833, to expand Christianity among the Native Americans northwards into what is today the U.S. state of California. San Diego’s mission is shown at 1:15, Mission San Luis Rey de Francia is shown at 2:00, and San Juan Capistrano at 2:15, including ruins at 2:44, San Gabriel mission at 2:50. San Fernando mission is seen at 4:00, and San Buenaventura at 4:30, Santa Inez at 5:00. At 6:00, Mission La Purísima Concepción. San Luis Obispo is seen at 7:30. San Antonio de Padua is seen at 8:30. At 9:00, the ruins of the Soledad mission are seen. At 9:27, the San Carlos Borromeo de Carmelo mission is seen, where Junipero Serra is buried.
Junípero Serra y Ferrer, O.F.M., (November 24, 1713 – August 28, 1784) was a Roman Catholic Spanish priest and friar of the Franciscan Order who founded a mission in Baja California and the first nine of 21 Spanish missions in California from San Diego to San Francisco, in what was then Alta California in the Province of Las Californias, New Spain.
Serra was beatified by Pope John Paul II on 25 September 1988 in Vatican City. Pope Francis canonized him on 23 September 2015, at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, D.C., during his first visit to the United States. Because of Serra’s recorded acts of piety combined with his missionary efforts, he was granted the posthumous title Apostle of California. Up the Camino Real the San Juan Baptista missions and Santa Clara missions are seen at the 10:30 mark. San Jose de Guadalupe is seen at 11:00. Mission San Francisco is seen at 11:20, also known as Mission Dolores — considered the most beautiful of all missions. San Francisco Solano is seen at 11:40 and Sonoma, completes this journey through the “Bells of the Past”.
The declaration of Serra as a Catholic saint by the Holy See was controversial with some Native Americans who criticize Serra’s treatment of their ancestors and associate him with the suppression of their culture.
Motion picture films don’t last forever; many have already been lost or destroyed. For almost two decades, we’ve worked to collect, scan and preserve the world as it was captured on 35mm, 16mm and 8mm movies — including home movies, industrial films, and other non-fiction. If you have endangered films you’d like to have scanned, or wish to donate celluloid to Periscope Film so that we can share them with the world, we’d love to hear from you. Contact us via the weblink below.
This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD and 2k. For more information visit http://www.PeriscopeFilm.com
