1565 – The city of St. Augustine was established on this date. Pedro Menéndez de Avilés sighted land on August 28. He named the site San Augustin after Augustine of Hippo. Menéndez sailed through the inlet into Matanzas Bay and disembarked near the Timucua town of Seloy on September 7. When Menéndez and his men came ashore, a mass was held by Father Francisco Lopez. St. Augustine would go on to become the oldest continuously occupied European settlement in what would become the United States. The event is memorialized at The Mission of Nombre de Dios. The Mission, with the Shrine of Our Lady of La Lechee, is the oldest in the United States.