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The native people lived in southern California for thousands of years before the Spanish arrived to build Mission San Diego. They had stone and bone tools. They hunted and gathered food. Some of them moved when the seasons changed. Others lived in one place.
These are some of the things we know about people who lived in the area that became Mission Diego. About 25,000 people lived in the Southern California when the Spanish arrived. The Indians saw white men a few times before the missionaries and soldiers came in 1769. From the very beginning, the Indians tried to keep the white men out. They attacked the first Spanish visitors.
