Although the history of Santa Fe is generally well documented, much prior to Spanish settlement and conquest has been overlooked by scholars. Evidence of occupation dates back to 1000 AD, when people from the Pueblos that line the Rio Grande to the south, migrated north and established pit house communities along the small rivers that flowed out of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. One of these waterways was the Santa Fe River. Life here was rich, with fertile farming opportunities to the south and thriving populations of native fauna in the mountains to the north.

The geographic location made this region a crossroads for trade between the pueblos and the nomadic plains tribes. The fruits of this trade opportunity are evident at the ruins of Pecos Pueblo, 30 miles to the east, where as many as 2,000 people lived in multiple story apartment-like structures. However, this wealth came at a price. Comanche war bands from the east and Apaches from the south made regular raids on the pueblo and its outlying communities. This prompted the construction of a defensive wall around the perimeter of the main building. Most archaeologists agree that the small villages along the Santa Fe River were abandoned for the relative safety of the pueblo about 150 years before the first Europeans arrived.

The Spaniards were the first to come. Returning to Mexico City from an exploration into the unknown country to the north, Fray Marcos de Niza told a compelling story of a golden city. This story encouraged Francisco Vasquez de Coronado to lead an expedition of more than 1,000 men into the north in 1540. The gold was not there, but Coronado established a winter headquarters at Tiguex, some 50 miles south of the Santa Fe Valley and proclaimed the lands of the American Southwest to be the “Spanish Kingdom of New Mexico.”

Some 50 years later, Don Juan de Onate was selected to lead the first group of Spanish settlers into New Mexico. The group eventually settled across the Rio Grande from San Juan Pueblo, 25 miles north of Santa Fe. In July of 1598, Onate began exploring Spain’s new territory. One reconnaissance party came under attack near Acoma Pueblo and 13 Spanish scouts were killed. Onate returned to Acoma in force the next year and the ensuing battle resulted in the deaths of hundreds of Acoma people and the enslavement of hundreds more. On Onate’s orders, a foot was hacked from the legs of 24 Acoma men, as punishment for crimes against the Spanish Crown.

Years of unrest followed and Onate wrote Mexico of his plans to move the provincial capitol from San Juan to the valley of the Santa Fe River. In 1610, Don Pedro de Peralta was sent to expedite the move, but Onate was not to be a part of it. He was returned to Mexico where he stood trial for mistreatment of the native people. Peralta and a group of surveyors laid out the streets of Santa Fe (Holy Faith) and determined the sites for the municipal buildings and the nation’s oldest capitol city was born. The oldest public building in the United States, the Palace of the Governors still stands on the north side of the Santa Fe Plaza.

For the next seven decades, Spanish missionary work ruled in Northern New Mexico while Franciscan priests established missions and forced Catholicism upon the native people. In 1680, the Pueblo Tribes united and revolted against the Spanish, driving the 2,500 settlers back to Mexico. Santa Fe was burned, with the exception of the Palace of the Governors and other key buildings. The native people occupied the city until 1702, when Don Diego de Vargas laid siege to the city and retook it with no bloodshed.

A new policy regarding the treatment of Pueblo people, coupled with frequent raids and battles with Apaches and Navajos, led to a more peaceful coexistence with the northern Pueblo tribes. The city prospered and grew as more and more Spanish settlers moved to the region from Mexico. In 1821, Mexico won its independence from Spain and Santa Fe became the capitol of Nuevo Mejico. This opened up trade with the American country to the east and in September of that same year, William Becknell left Arrow Rock, Missouri with a caravan of goods. One thousand miles and a month and a half later, he arrived in Santa Fe, selling his goods for huge profits. He returned to Missouri the following spring with a load of hides, blankets and Mexican exports, profiting again on the other end. Thus, the Santa Fe Trail was born. As this trade flourished, taxes on imported merchandise funded the operation of the provincial capitol.

The trail eventually brought American settlers to the area. This ultimately helped spark the Mexican American war in 1846. In August of that year, American General Stephen Watts Kearny raised the Stars and Stripes over the city. Two years later, the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was signed, and the lands of Nuevo Mejico became the United States Territory of New Mexico.

Although insignificant in the overall scope of the American Civil War, a locally significant battle was fought between Union forces and the small force of Texas Confederates, who briefly held Santa Fe in 1863. The Texans were defeated at Glorieta Pass, east of the city near the ruins of Pecos Pueblo.

The railroad arrived in 1880, with Santa Fe as the western terminus of the Atchinson, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad, and the economy boomed. Around the turn of the century, the railroad began contracting with artists to portray the sweeping beauty of the American West in an effort to attract tourists to ride the rails. Along with the tourists came more artists who often arrived penniless in Santa Fe. The beauty of the landscape and natural light inspired the artists and Santa Fe gradually became a haven for native and transplanted artists.

Tourists flocked to the city from across the world to experience the tri-cultural setting and shop for “exotic” arts and crafts sold by the Pueblo Indians on the Santa Fe Plaza. In 1926, city residents created the Old Santa Fe Association, and lobbied the local government to take measures to preserve the ambiance of the city. In the 1950s, due in part to these efforts, building codes were enacted to prevent the construction of any buildings that did not reflect the architecture of the Pueblos, or of the Spanish Colonial period. The result is a mystical urban environment and a city now known as “The City Different.”

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