California: Spanish and Mexican Period

Beginning in 1769, Spain supported the establishment of twenty-one Franciscan missions, military strongholds, and small civilian colonies from San Diego to north of San Francisco. The Spanish, Mexican, and Mexican Indian colonists brought with them many plants and domesticated animals from Mexico, including almonds, apples, apricots, bananas, barley, beans, cherries, chickpeas, chilies, citrons, dates, figs, grapes, lemons, lentils, limes, maize, olives, nectarines, oranges, peaches, pears, plums, pomegranates, quinces, tomatoes, walnuts, and wheat, as well as chickens, cows, donkeys, goats, horses, sheep, and domesticated turkeys. The colonists supplemented their fare with most of the same types of game hunted by the Native Americans. The colonists made corn tortillas, as the wheat varieties that they brought with them were not easily cultivated in California. When wheat became more abundant, it was used to make tortillas on special occasions. The Spanish established the first flour mill in 1786.