Espanola Valley History

Beautiful regional pottery.

The roots of indigenous peoples in the Espanola Valley area can be traced to roughly 1,000 years ago when the Anasazi people created cliff dwellings in an area just west of Espanola, now marked as the Puye Cliff Dwellings National Landmark. It is estimated that approximately 1500 people lived in these dwellings from the late 1100s to roughly 1580.

But the Puye dwellings marked the beginning of the end of the Anasazi civilization that had thrived for many centuries throughout the Four Corners and upper Rio Grande drainage area. The Anasazi's major pueblo at Chaco Canyon began to collapse in the mid-1100s and the extensive cliff dwellings at Mesa Verde were abandoned in approximately 1300. The collapse of Anasazi civilization has never been fully understood, though many historians believe that drought and harsh climactic conditions were the catalyst for the ancient tribe's demise.

As the main centers of Anasazi civilization were abandoned, surviving inhabitants resettled in smaller villages and pueblos in the region. It is believed that the Anasazi are the ancestors of many of today's pueblos in the Espanola Valley and surrounding areas, including the pueblos of Santa Clara and Ohkay Owingeh (formerly known as San Juan Pueblo).

In July of 1598 (well before the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth in 1620), having blazed 1,800 miles of trail known as El Camino Real, Don Juan de Onate founded Spain's first permanent European settlement in the West, just north of today's city of Espanola. Onate named the settlement San Juan de los Caballeros; the existing Ohkay Owingeh settlement became known as San Juan Pueblo after Onate's arrival. The 500 or so new Spanish residents of San Juan raised crops, perfected a system of acequias (irrigation ditches), mined for silver and traded with the nearby Indians.

Though initially welcomed by the Indians and supported by the other settlers, Onate quickly became unpopular by treating the Indians with unnecessary brutality and mismanaging his own colony. Within a dozen years he had been replaced by Juan Martinez de Montoya, and then Pedro de Peralta, who chose a nearby riverbank to establish the capital of a new colony. This riverbank town, Santa Fe, is now the oldest capital city in the country.

Although settlers in the Espanola Valley were forced out during the Pueblo Revolt of 1680 (led by Pope, a Ohkay Owingeh/San Juan native), in 1695, Don Diego de Vargas led resettlement of the valley at Santa Cruz. For the next 150 years, change was slow but steady, as the King of Spain continued to grant lands for settlement by colonists from New Spain (what we call Old Mexico).

With the end of the Mexican-American war, New Mexico became an American territory. Traffic on the Santa Fe Trail brought homesteaders and frontiersmen to the valley. Then, in 1880, the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad, affectionately known as the Chile Line, extended its southern terminus to a spot near the junction of the Rio Grande and Chama rivers. It was called Espanola. The railroad brought Anglo merchants who saw the rural Hispanic and Indian communities here as ideal markets for manufactured goods from the East. The new city of Espanola quickly became a vibrant trading hub.

By the early 1940s, when passenger service was discontinued at Espanola, nearby Los Alamos had become a bustling, though secret, center of activity. For 65 years, starting with the Manhattan Project, Los Alamos National Laboratories has been hugely influential, economically and socially.

The 1960s began a period of rapid growth in Northern New Mexico, and Espanola remained the commercial center of the valley. Artists and other newcomers, attracted to the scenic vistas, quiet rural character and unique culture, settled among the farmers, ranchers, merchants and lab workers.

In 2005, the San Juan Pueblo officially changed its name back to Ohkay Owingeh, "Place of the Strong People," its original name before the arrival of Spanish settlers. The largest of the region's pueblos with approximately 6,800 members as of 2005, Ohkay Owingeh is also the headquarters of the Eight Northern Indian Pueblos Council.

Today, the Espanola Valley is a community of deep traditions, yet on the forefront of innovation and scientific research. The unique diversity of its population, astounding natural beauty and rich cultural heritage continue to draw visitors and newcomers.