Juan de Padilla

Father Juan de Padilla (1500 – 1542), born in Andalusia, was a Spanish Roman Catholic missionary who spent much of his life exploring North America alongside Francisco Vasquez de Coronado. [web cite|url=http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11385a.htm|title=Juan de Padilla|work=Catholic Encyclopedia]

Over three hundred Spaniards, including Padilla and three other Franciscans, accompanied Coronado on his quest for the Seven Cities of Gold, a mythical land of great wealth. When Coronado abandoned his search, Padilla and others followed him to explore what is now the Southwestern United States; Padilla then becoming one of the first Europeans to see the Grand Canyon. But, when Coronado was told by a native named the "Turk" that a great land called Quivira was in modern-day Kansas, Coronado's entire party immediately left in search of it. After reaching the location, for twenty-five days in 1541, the Spaniards camped alongside a Wichita Indian village; but no gold was found, and the Turk was strangled to death. Coronado returned to the Southwest and Padilla followed, but one year later Padilla would return to Kansas to preach to the Wichita, and establish the first Christian mission in the present-day United States. He was later killed in New Mexico, and is considered to be one of the first Christian martyrs in the U.S. [Engelhardt, p. 14: "... [in] 1542, three Friars Minor were martyred in New Mexico as victims of their zeal for the Christian Faith. They were Fr. Juan de Padilla, Fr. Juan de la Cruz, and Brother Luis de Ubeda or Escalona.]

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*cite book|author=Engelhardt, Zephyrin, O.F.M.|year=1908|title=The Missions and Missionaries of Kansas, Alaska, ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ Volume One|publisher=The James H. Barry Co., San Francisco, CA|id=