68 GUIDEBOOK OF THE WESTERN UNITED STATES 
governor of Tejas, is 6 miles south of the center of San Antonio. Its 
south window, a fine example of stone carving, was exhibited at the 
World’s Fair in St. Louis in 1904. Its beautiful old altar, ornamented 
by a noted Spanish sculptor, is now in the Cathedral of San Fernando, 
on the east side of the Military Plaza. This cathedral was begun in 
1734, completed by a grant from King Ferdinand of Spain in 1744, 
and reconstructed in 1868. The mission La Purisima Concepcién de 
Acufia, 2 miles south of the center of the city, originally established 
in eastern Texas, was moved to San Antonio in 1731 and is still in use. 
Near it in 1835 James Bowie and a party of 92 Texans won a fight 
against five times their number of Mexicans. Bowie died in 1836 in 
the defense of the Alamo. The mission San Juan de Capistrano, 
which was established in 1731 near the San Juan ford of the San 
Antonio River, was also formerly near Nacogdoches. The mission 
San Francisco de la Espada was originally in eastern Texas, having 
been the first mission established there. Founded in 1690 under the 
name San Francisco de los Tejas, it was abandoned three years later, 
reestablished in 1716 under the name San Francisco de los Neches, 
and transferred in 1731 to the west bank of the San Antonio River, 
9 miles south of the center of the city. Aqueducts built by monks 
and Indians two centuries ago still irrigate the gardens at this place. 
The older part of San Antonio is built on a plain of alluvial depos- 
its, but the northern, western, and eastern parts extend onto rolling 
hills of Upper Cretaceous rocks. A fault with downthrow on the 
east side passes through the northwestern part of the city. On its 
west side are hills of Austin chalk, consisting largely of a soft chalky 
limestone * which has been quarried extensively for use in building, 
especially for houses in the older part of the city. Exposures of this 
material extend through part of Brackenridge Park, notably near the 
Sunken Gardens and Monkey Island, and in the rolling hills to the 
northwest, but much of the rock weathers into soil on the sloping sur- 
faces. To the west this formation dips beneath the clays of the 
Taylor formation,” on which the western part of the city is built. 
In the slopes of the gravel-capped ridges extending south from Fort 
Sam Houston there are exposures of clay of the Navarro formation, 
which extends southward to an overlap of clay and sand of the Mid- 
way formation of Tertiary age. 
* This chalky material contains many 
shells of Foraminifera, minute organ- 
isms that lived in the sea water that 
covered this area during most of Cre- 
aucella, 
texanum, Inoceramus undula- 
leglieats, (upper 
beds), and other marine species, A 
1-foot layer composed of the shells of 
Gryphaea 
along the 
Park. (See pl. 8, A.) 
°° This formation, which is about 475 
feet thick, contains many fossils includ- 
ine: various oysters such as Ezxogyra 
1, E. laeviuscula, and Ostrea aff. 
na. 
