El Triunfo De La Cruz. The First Ship Built In The Calufornias

THEODORE H. HITTELL

Publication: California Historical Society, 1963, San Francisco

First edition thus. 12mo. Tan cloth, titles on paper label affixed to the front cover, [6], 15 pp. California Historical Society Special Publication No. 38. Printed by Roger Levenson of the Tamalpais Press, Berkeley, California. The story of the first ship built in California. "In 1719, due to the difficulties in obtaining supplies from the mainland, Father Ugarte decided to build a vessel on the Baja peninsula. With the help of an English carpenter named William Strafford and the collaboration of the Cochimí indigenous people, they used wood from the güéribo trees (Populus brandegeei) that grew in the mountains near Mulegé. The sloop, named El Triunfo de la Cruz (The Triumph of the Cross), was launched on November 14, 1719, and became an essential means of communication and transporting supplies between the missions on the peninsula and the mainland." Fine, bright copy that lacks the dust jacket.