National parks: Sacristy - public domain image

From the sanctuary, a sacred place, you enter the sacristy, a room not blessed or consecrated. This did not make it any less important. Priests kept the clothing and articles used in the performance of their duties here. In the sacristy they documented and stored the records of important events, signing their names as witness to marriages, births, and deaths.
For about twenty-five years, this sacristy was used for its original purpose. After the mission was abandoned, the church changed from a house of worship to just a house. People who traveled through the area could not resist its lure. With the protection of the sacristy's thick walls and a warming fire, they followed, without conscious thought, the foot steps of the priests before them. They recorded their visits not on parchment bound in books, but on the plaster walls. Tired "49ers" on their way to the California goldfields. Soldiers and cowboys spent nights here, lit fires, and recorded their stay.