The Santa Teresa Spring

The Santa Teresa Spring. Folklore tells of the spring as a sacred place. Believed to travel from the Sierra Mountains via underground rivers, fresh, maybe even magical, water continually seeps from this hillside formation of hard gray sandstone., According to Hispanic folklore passed down orally and printed for newspapers in the 1930s, local Indians became sick, possibly from painting their bodies with red (mercury containing) cinnabar., After a failed attempt to placate the Great Spirit, Ohlone Chief Umunhum gathered everyone at their meeting place of the gigantic rock. Umunhum shot an arrow with a feather tied to it into the sky as a final request for help. A woman in flowing black robes appeared and touched the rock and the woman motioned the Indians to drink from and bathe in the stream. The sick were cured. , 1930s newspaper article, It is said that when Jose Joaquin Bernal heard this story, he believed the vision to be that of Santa Teresa, a healing saint of the Spanish, and thus chose her name as the title of his rancho. The spring became a sacred place where mass was held every October 15, Fiesta Day of Santa Teresa., In 1925, Fathers Seraphina and Ricarti of Holy Family Church came to the Rancho and presented Doña Jesusita Bernal with a medallion blessed by the pope and a statue of Santa Teresa brought from Rome. In 1928, to honor his deceased mother, Pedro Bernal built a shrine next to the spring and placed the medallion and statue inside. Although the statue and medallion have been missing for years, the shrine’s base and inscription are still visible., Inset Images: , Above: Statuette of Saint Teresa, once located at the spring , Right: Jesusita Patron Bernal