Walker Elementary Students Are Given Missions to Learn

Fourth-graders at Adeline Walker Elementary School had a visual history lesson Monday as Santa Ana’s mayor and a friend of the school’s founder dropped by to present them with an illustrated book on California missions.

“The California Missions: A Complete Pictorial History and Visitor’s Guide” was a gift from Native Daughters of the Golden West, a civic group made up of California-born men and women.

Published and written by editors at the Menlo Park-based Sunset Publishing Corp., the 320-page book includes drawings and photographs to illustrate the missions’ history from the time of El Camino Real--the road that once linked the state’s missions.

San Francisco-based Native Daughters and its members are distributing hundreds of the books across the state this year to raise awareness of the historic buildings.

“People are coming in from out of state, and nobody knows about these missions,” said the organization’s public relations chair, June Painter.

The nonprofit group, its statewide chapters and individual members worked out an arrangement to purchase the $20 books from the publisher for $11, Painter said.

In Orange County, the local chapter will donate books to Walker and Pio Pico Elementary School because they are named for people with links to the Native Daughters.

Mickey Welle is a member of the local chapter, as was her longtime friend, the late Adeline Walker. Welle and half a dozen other members were on hand for Monday’s presentation in Santa Ana.

Principal Robert DeBerry welcomed the newest addition to the school’s library. “It’s important to keep history alive,” he said.

Mayor Miguel A. Pulido Jr. encouraged the students to study hard and, surveying the room, said of the Native Daughters assembled there: “You’re looking at a little bit of California history today.”