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National Geographic : 1966 Feb
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The rest of St. Augustine's early history reflected what was taking place in Europe. As a sea power and a colonial empire, Spain was going down, England coming up. By the middle of the 17th century, Boston was a thriving port of 15,000 people; St. Augustine had fewer than 1,500. In the early 1600's the King of Spain, now Philip III, seriously considered abandoning St. Augustine entirely. One strong factor in saving it was that at last it began to produce a successful crop: not gold, not silver, but souls-Indian converts. The Franciscan missions in St. Augustine's early years are perhaps its chief success story. The humble friars had a peculiar ability for making friends with the Indians and winning them over to Christianity. Perhaps it was because they were willing to endure hardship, poverty, and even martyr dom, to move out into the woods and live 214 among the savages. As one historian relates, "A lone Franciscan, with no weapons other than his Cross and Bible, could do more with the Indians than 100 men-at-arms." The first handful of Franciscans reached Florida in 1573. By 1606 a visiting bishop from Cuba was able to confirm 2,000 Indians as Catholics, and that was only a beginning. By 1655 the Franciscans had established more than 30 mission centers, stretching north to what is now Georgia and South Carolina, and west beyond Tallahassee. They had some 26,000 converts. Sea-shell Fortress Survives the Centuries Yet despite its success as a missionary head quarters, St. Augustine as a military outpost continued to teeter on the brink of oblivion. There were more raids, and the early wooden forts continued to be overrun; they were burned down, or they rotted away and had
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