Remembering El Paso

El Paso is a city with an international history and culture that is tied to the Rio Grande. Native Americans followed the river and traded with other groups that lived near it. In 1598, Don Juan de Oñate traveled north with a large caravan from Zacatecas, Mexico, to what became known as El Paso del Norte. Near San Elizario, Oñate claimed the area for Spain, and it became a trade center along El Camino Real, the Royal Highway, which went north all the way to the Española Valley in New Mexico. With the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, in 1848, the Rio Grande became the international boundary between the United States and Mexico, and El Paso became a town of westernmost Texas.