Mission Santa Ysabel's (Pronounced "Isabel") beginnings are not clear. One account attributes Sunday, September 20, 1818 as the day when a site was blessed at Elcuanan. Mission Santa Ysabel is an "asistencia" (Extension or sub-missions) Mission to Mission San Diego, one of three mission asistencias San Diego County. Santa Ysabel is sometimes referred to as the "Church in the Desert."
Whereas Mission Pala, an asistensia to Mission San Louis Rey de Francia, needed only a resident priest to be a full functioning mission, Sant Ysabel asistencia was never more than an outlying outpost to Mission San Diego de Alcala, a chapel and a few residences to serve the needs in this agricultural region of Mission San Diego's lands.
Santa Ysabel Asistencia was to have been a link in a second chain of missions in Alta California, an inland chain, equal in importance to the established coastal chain. The Mexican Revolution ended this effort. After 1836, the Padres only made occasional visits. The building soon after fell into ruin. The ocasional masses were then celbrated in a grass ramada.
The Santa Ysabel Rancho passed into the possession of Jose Joaquin Ortega and Edward Stokes in 1844. The American traveler John Russell Bartlett wrote in 1852 that Santa Ysabel Mission was a roofless church and a few huts. Former mission lands were given to the Mesa Grande Reservation in 1883 and the Santa Ysabel Reservation in 1893. Sometime later, three acres were returned to the Catholic Church and services resumed. A new church was built near the original site, the corner stone being laid September 14, 1924.
The asistencia raised wheat, barley, corn, beans, and also had orchards and vineyards.
A major event in the more recent history of the Asistencia occurred on a summer night in 1926 when the beloved bells mysteriously disappeared, only the clappers remained on the ground. One of the two bells were reported to be the oldest bell in California. The older bell, inscribed: N.S. de Loreto, 1723, was named for Our Lady of Loreto and came from Loreto Mission, Baja California. The second bell was dedicated to San Pedro and dated 1767. The Indians traded six burro loads of wheat and barley. When the adobe chapel deteriorated and was no longer able to support the bells, they were hung from a wooden frame near the ramada. When Jose Maria Osuna discovered the bells missing, he took the clappers home for safe keeping. Eventually the clappers were returned to the mission in 1959 where they now rest in the museum. There is still no trace of the original bells. New bells were installed in 1993.
Today the new church is still open, Masses are held regularly. A small museum on the right side of the church is open during normal hours. The original church site is a short walk away with a few broken floor tiles marking its location.
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