June 7 Another De Anza Trail visit Mission San Gabriel

We worked our way over to the Mission, where there was a large Hispanic Wedding underway, lots of pretty dresses and sharp looking young men in tuxes.  This is a revisit to a stop on the Trail.  

San Gabriel is one of the string of 21 Missions founded by the Catholics back in the day and is an active Church today.  

Mission San Gabriel was founded on September 8, 1771 by Father Junipero Serra. The planned site for the Mission was along the banks of the Río de los Temblores (the River of the Earthquakes—the Santa Ana River). The priests chose an alternate site on a fertile plain located directly alongside the Rio Hondo in the Whittier Narrows.^[11] The site of the Misión Vieja (or "Old Mission") is located near the intersection of San Gabriel Boulevard and Lincoln Avenue in Montebello, California (known to the natives as Shevaanga). In 1776, a flash flood destroyed much of the crops and ruined the Mission complex, which was subsequently relocated five miles closer to the mountains in present-day San Gabriel (the native settlement of 'Iisanchanga). The Mission is the base from which the pueblo that became the city of Los Angeles was sent. On December 9, 1812 (the "Feast Day of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin"), a series of massive earthquakes shook Southern California. The 1812 Wrightwood earthquake caused the three-bell campanario, located adjacent to the chapel's east façade, to collapse. A larger, six-bell structure was subsequently constructed at the far end of the capilla. While no pictorial record exists to document what the original structure looked like, architectural historian Rexford Newcomb deduced the design and published a depiction in his 1916 work The Franciscan Mission Architecture of Alta California.

Legend has it that the founding expedition was confronted by a large group of native Tongva peoples whose intention was to drive the strangers away. One of the padres laid a painting of "Our Lady of Sorrows" on the ground for all to see, whereupon the natives, designated by the settlers as the Gabrieliños, immediately made peace with the missionaries, because they were so moved by the painting's beauty.^[1] Today the 300-year-old work hangs in front of and slightly to the left of the old high altar and reredos in the Mission's sanctuary.

A large stone cross stands in the center of the campo santo (cemetery), first consecrated in 1778 and then again on January 29, 1939 by the Los Angeles Archbishop John Cantwell. It serves as the final resting place for some 6,000 "neophytes;" a small stone marker denotes the gravesite of José de Los Santos, the last American Indian to be buried on the grounds, at the age of 101 in February 1921. Also interred at the Mission are the bodies of numerous Franciscan fathers who died during their time of service, as well as the remains of Reverend Raymond Catalan, C.M.F., who undertook the restoration of the Mission's gardens. Entombed at the foot of the altar are the remains of eight Franciscan priests (listed in order of interment): Father Miguel Sánchez, Father Antonio Cruzado, Father Francisco Dumetz, Father Roman Ulibarri, Father Joaquin P. Nuez, Father Gerónimo Boscana, Father José Bernardo Sánchez, and Father Blas Ordaz. Buried among the padres is centenarian Eulalia Perez de Guillén Mariné, the "keeper of the keys" under Spanish rule; her grave is marked by a bench dedicated in her memory.

Mission San Gabriel Arcángel circa 1900. The trail in the foreground is part of the original El Camino Real.

Well over 25,000 baptisms were conducted at San Gabriel between 1771 and 1834, making it the most prolific in the mission chain. In its heyday it furnished food and supplies to settlements and other missions throughout California. A majority of the Mission structures fell into ruins after it was secularized in November 1834. The once-extensive vineyards were falling to decay, with fences broken down and animals roaming freely through it.^[12]

The Mission's chapel functioned as a parish church for the City of San Gabriel from 1862 until 1908, when the Claretian Missionary Fathers came to San Gabriel and began the job of rebuilding and restoring the Mission. On October 1, 1987 the Whittier Narrows Earthquake damaged the property. A significant portion of the original complex has since been restored.

June 7 Juan Bautistia de Anza National Historic Trail - Griffith Park Los Angeles

We then cut over to the famous Griffith Park section of Los Angeles, to stop by the 
Ranger Station to get a stamp for the De Anza Trail.   There are probably 25 or more stops in California for this trail and we'll be getting to lots of them on the trip... A revisit for this trail.  

Some information on Griffith Park:

Griffith Park is a large municipal park at the eastern end of the Santa Monica Mountains in the Los Feliz neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. The park covers 4,310 acres of land, making it one of the largest urban parks in North America.

Griffith Park was the busiest destination in Los Angeles for on-location filming in 2011, with 346 production days, according to a FilmL.A. survey. Projects included the TV shows Criminal Minds and The Closer.^[9]

With its wide variety of scenes and close proximity to Hollywood and Burbank, many different production crews have found new ways and angles to film the same spots and make them look different. One would be hard pressed to find a spot in Griffith Park which has not been filmed or taped.

The Griffith Observatory, which sits atop the southern slope of Mount Hollywood, was featured prominently in the 1955 classic Rebel Without a Cause. A bronze bust of the film's star James Dean is on the grounds just outside the dome. Other movies filmed here include The Terminator (1984), Disney's The Rocketeer (1991), Stephen Sommer's 2004 film Van Helsing, The Majestic (2001), and Yes Man (2008). The area of the park around the Observatory also appears as a location in the role-playing video game Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines, which is set in Los Angeles.

Griffith Park has many other locations familiar to moviegoers. It was used as a location in the first two Back to the Future movies. In the first movie (released in 1985) it was used for Marty McFly's starting point when accelerating to 88 mph (142 km/h) in the film's climax, and in the second movie (released in 1989) it was used for the "River Road Tunnel" scene when Marty was trying to get the almanac back from Biff Tannen. The same tunnel was used as the entrance to Toontown in Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988). The park was also featured in the Robert Altman movie Short Cuts (1993).

A sampling of television shows filmed here includes the Nickelodeon show Salute Your Shorts and an episode of Remington Steele in which Laura Holt is trying to evade the police. The park was also the location for Adam Lambert's music video for his single, "If I Had You". Griffith Park and Griffith Observatory are significant in the Star Trek: Voyager episode "Future's End" (originally aired November 6, 1996). The crew are thrown into the past and Griffith Observatory discovers Voyager. The tunnel was also used in the 1960s spy television series Mission: Impossible.

In John Rechy's novel City of Night and non-fiction book The Sexual Outlaw, Griffith Park is the scene of gay pick-ups and public sex as well as numerous gay bashings and violence from the LAPD in the 1960s and 1970s. It is the scene of similar activities in several novels by James Ellroy.

Bronson Canyon, aka Bronson Caves, is a popular location for motion picture and television filming, especially of western and science fiction low-budget films, including Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956). The site was also used as the location for the climactic scene in John Ford's classic 1956 western, The Searchers. The scene includes John Wayne cornering his niece, Debbie (Natalie Wood), in one of the caves with the apparent intent of killing her. He relents at the last moment, however and, in the film's most famous shot, picks her up in his arms and turns to carry her back home. Many fans of the film are startled by the revelation that this scene was actually filmed in urban Los Angeles, probably due to how well the shot is integrated into the rest of the picture's location scenery. The craggy site of an old quarry, a tunnel in this canyon was also used as the entrance to the Batcave in the opening sequence of the 1960s Batman television series, and in numerous other shows. The natural "cave" walls are preserved by the many layers of paint used to make them look like rock

June 7 Santa Monica Mountains NRA California

After we left LAX we got our rental car, and headed out and up into the mountains around Los Angeles to the Sooky Goldman/William O. Douglas Visitor Center for the Santa Monica Mountains NRA.    It was in the Franklin Canyon area of the park. Pretty drive up into the Beverly Hills area, sadly, we hadn't unpacked our camera, so you'll have to take my word for it that it was an interesting and pretty drive. The Visitor Center had some nice exhibits about the local wildlife- got the stamp and a couple of postcards and a sticker....

This is a revisit, as I had been to two other stamping locations for this park.

  

Revisit to Liberty Square, the Visitor Information Center for Fort Sumter National Monument, Charleston SC

Finished up the trio of Charleston National Park visits with a quick stop at Liberty Square, which is the embarkation point for the ferry to Fort Sumter.  Had some missing stamps here, but I managed to still miss one of the bonus stamps.  I did get the new Civil War 150th stamp.

Date of revisit was April 24, 2014.  

Liberty Square is shown as the Visitor Education Center on the map.

Revisit to Fort Moultrie, a part of Fort Sumter National Park, Sullivan's Island SC April 24, 2014

Tina and I ran over to Fort Moultrie next to pick up a couple of missing stamps from my last visit in 2010-  

Fort Moultrie is a fort that protected the entrance to Charleston Harbor and is part of the Fort Sumter National Monument.

Fort Moultrie

The first fort on Sullivan's Island was still incomplete when Commodore Sir Peter Parker and nine warships attacked it on June 28, 1776. After a nine-hour battle, the ships were forced to retire. Charleston was saved from British occupation, and the fort was named in honor of its commander, Colonel. William Moultrie. In 1780 the British finally captured Charleston, abandoning it only on the advent of peace. After the Revolution, Fort Moultrie was neglected, and by 1791 little of it remained. Then, in 1793, war broke out between England and France. The next year Congress, seeking to safeguard American shores, authorized the first system of nationwide coastal fortifications. A second Fort Moultrie, one of 20 new forts along the Atlantic coast, was completed in 1798. It too suffered from neglect and was finally destroyed by a hurricane in 1804. By 1807 many of the other First System fortifications were in need of extensive repair. Congress responded by authorizing funds for a Second System, which included a third Fort Moultrie. By 1809 a new brick fort stood on Sullivan's Island.  Between 1809 and 1860 Fort Moultrie changed little. The parapet was altered and the armament modernized, but the big improvement in Charleston's defenses during this period was the construction of Fort Sumter at the entrance of the harbor. The forts ringing Charleston Harbor - Moultrie, Sumter, Johnson, and Castle Pinckney - were meant to complement each other, but ironically received their baptism of fire as opponents. For more information about the Fort Moultrie of 1860, including 3D models and animation, visit Battlefields in Motion. In December 1860 South Carolina seceded from the Union, and the Federal garrison abandoned Fort Moultrie for the stronger Sumter. Three and a half months later, Confederate troops shelled Sumter into submission, plunging the nation into civil war. In April 1863, Federal iron-clads and shore batteries began a 20-month bombardment of Sumter and Moultrie, yet Charleston's defenses held. When the Confederate army evacuated the city in February 1865, Fort Sumter was little more than a pile of rubble and Fort Moultrie lay hidden under the band of sand that protected its walls from Federal shells. The new rifled cannon used during the Civil War had demolished the brick-walled fortifications. Fort Moultrie was modernized in the 1870s, employing concepts developed during the war. Huge new cannon were installed, and magazines and bombproofs were built of thick concrete, then buried under tons of earth to absorb the explosion of heavy shells. In 1885, President Grover Cleveland appointed Secretary of War William C. Endicott to head a board to review the coastal defenses in light of newly developing weapons technology. The system that emerged, named for Endicott, again modernized the nation's fortifications. New batteries of concrete and steel were constructed in Fort Moultrie. Larger weapons were emplaced elsewhere on Sullivan's Island, and the old fort became just a small part of the Fort Moultrie Military Reservation that covered much of the island.As technology changed, harbor defense became more complex. The world wars brought new threats of submarine and aerial attack and required new means of defense at Moultrie. Yet these armaments also became obsolete as nuclear weapons and guided missiles altered the entire concept of national defense. Today Fort Moultrie has been restored to portray the major periods of its history. A visitor to the fort moves steadily backwards in time from the World War II Harbor Entrance Control Post to the site of the Palmetto-log fort of 1776.  The fort is also the final resting place of General William Moultrie, for whom the fort is named:                                      William Moultrie Birth:  Nov. 23, 1730 Charleston South Carolina, USA Death:  Sept. 27, 1805 Major General William Moultrie. Born in Charleston, S.C., November 23, 1730. Second in command of Charleston's defenses during the American Revolution. He was taken prisoner when Charleston fell to the British in 1780. Member of the South Carolina House of Representatives 1783-1784. Lieutenant Governor of South Carolina in 1784 and Governor in 1785. He was elected to the South Carolina Senate in 1787 and was again elected Governor in 1792. Moultrie published in 1802 Memoirs of the American Revolution. He died in Charleston on September 27, 1805, and is buried on the grounds of Fort Moultrie, which is named after him.

Revisit to Charles Pinckney National Historical Site - Mt Pleasant, South Carolina

Last time I was here was in 2008, when we were on a trip with the Kingston's-  Wow!  They had added a couple of stamps, so that was a reason to visit.  

It's stop number 2 on the map.  About 13 miles from our hotel.  

The location is on the old Snee Plantation, and is the last remaining parcel of land that belonged to Charles Pinckney, who was an early and noted public servant of South Carolina.  

Charles Pinckney National Historic Site

Location	Mount Pleasant, South Carolina, USA
Nearest city	Charleston, South Carolina
Area	28.45 acres (12 ha)
Established	September 8, 1988
Visitors	45,254 (in 2011)
Built	1824
Added to NRHP	April 13, 1973
Designated NHL	November 7, 1973

Charles Pinckney National Historic Site preserves a portion of Charles Pinckney's Snee Farm. The site is located at 1254 Long Point Road, Mount Pleasant, South Carolina.
Pinckney fought in the American Revolutionary War and became one of the principal framers of the United States Constitution. He served as Governor of South Carolina, and as a member of the United States Senate and the House of Representatives. He was President Thomas Jefferson's minister to Spain.The main house on the farm was constructed in 1828, after Pickney's death.

New Pin Addition- Juan Bautista de Anza NST

I was able to get a De Anza Trial pin sent in the mail-  I've been to I think 7 locations for the trail in Arizona, and a couple in California-  Plan on getting to about another 6-7 locations in California on the June trip with Cooper.