  (Abridged) We analyze photometry and spectroscopy of a sample of 63 clusters
at 0.3<z<0.9 drawn from the Las Campanas Distant Cluster Survey to empirically
constrain models of cluster galaxy evolution. Specifically, by combining data
on our clusters with those from the literature we parametrize the redshift
dependence of 1) M*_I in the observed frame; 2) the V-I color of the E/S0 red
sequence in the observed frames; and 3) the I-K' color of the E/S0 red sequence
in the observed frame. Using the peak surface brightness of the cluster
detection, S, as a proxy for cluster mass, we find no correlation between S and
M* or the location of the red envelope in V-I. We suggest that these
observations can be explained with a model in which luminous early type
galaxies (or more precisely, the progenitors of current day luminous early type
galaxies) form the bulk of their stellar populations at high redshift (>~ 5)
and in which many of these galaxies, if not all, accrete mass either in the
form of evolved stellar populations or gas that causes only a short term
episode of star formation at lower redshifts (1.5 < z < 2). Our data are too
crude to reach conclusions regarding the evolutionary state of any particular
cluster or to investigate whether the morphological evolution of galaxies
matches the simple scenario we discuss, but the statistical nature of this
study suggests that the observed evolutionary trends are universal in massive
clusters.
