San Juan Bautista

1862 – 1870

St. John’s Institution, San Juan Bautista, CA

In June 1863 Sister Scholastica Logsden wrote from Los Angeles:

“I will try to leave here next week, taking the Sisters with me that have been named for San Juan Bautista. We will go in the Overland Mail Stage; the owner of this line of stages will give us free passage if we can obtain seats enough.  Dear Sister Ann Gillen will accompany us in order that I may have a Sister to return with me.”
(Letter to Superiors in Emmitsburg)

The tiny community of San Juan Bautista was a stopover station on the route between San Francisco and Los Angeles. As the community grew, Father Anthony Ubach, pastor at the Old Mission, realized a need for a school and orphanage. Pleading to Emmitsburg for assistance, the Daughters of Charity leadership sent three Sisters to minister to the children and their community. Sisters Phileta McCarthy, Xavier Schauer, and Clara Cisneros settled into the cloister of the historic mission. Classes at St. John’s Institution were held in a room behind the sacristy. By 1870, due to the lack of students and financial support, exacerbated by an ongoing drought, the Daughters left San Juan Bautista and were missioned elsewhere.