Historical Marker · No. 132642
Mission Guevavi
Nogales, Santa Cruz County County · Arizona
The O'odham called this place Gu waihe, big well, long before it carried a saint's name. Kino founded a mission here in 1691, a day after Tumacácori, and made Guevavi the cabecera, the headquarters church for the whole upper Santa Cruz. Relentless Apache raids emptied it by the 1770s, and the adobe walls have been melting back into the ground ever since. Today the ruin sits on a protected preserve, closed but for rare guided visits. The oldest of these missions is also the most nearly gone.
What the plaque says
This site contains the ruins of Mission Los Santos Angeles de Guevavi, first established by Father Eusebio Francisco Kino in 1691. The property was donated to The Archaeological Conservancy for a permanent Archaeological Preserve by Ralph Wingfield on July 5, 1988 in memory of Marjorie Bangs Wingfield., Listed on the National Register of Historic Places as a National Historic Landmark, this property has received funding assistance from the National Park Service and Arizona State Historic Preservation Office/State Parks Board.
Where it stands
31.40966, -110.90087 · Directions
Worth the stop nearby
- Tumacácori National Historical Park — 14 miArizona's first mission, on O'odham ground along the Santa Cruz River.
More markers nearby
- Padre Eusebio Francisco Kino — 4.4 mi
- Camp Stephen D. Little — 4.7 mi
- Jacob Isaacson — 5.7 mi
- John Ward's Ranch — 9.3 mi