New Mexico History

New Mexico is a state with a rich and diverse history, dating back thousands of years. The land was originally inhabited by Native American tribes, including the Pueblo, Apache, and Navajo, which developed unique cultures, traditions, and ways of life.

For the first time, in Fifth Sun, the history of the Aztecs is offered in all its complexity based solely on the texts written by the indigenous people themselves. Camilla Townsend presents an accessible and humanized depiction of these native Mexicans, rather than seeing them as the exotic, bloody figures of European stereotypes.

Visit the Land of Enchantment! Learn about New Mexico's history, geography, weather, people, and more in this book that's all about our 47th state.

Listen to this audiobook today to learn about the History of Arizona and New Mexico!

With the end of the Civil War, the nation recommenced its expansion onto traditional Indian tribal lands, setting off a wide-ranging conflict that would last more than three decades. In an exploration of the wars and negotiations that destroyed tribal ways of life even as they made possible the emergence of the modern United States, Peter Cozzens gives us both sides in comprehensive and singularly intimate detail.

New Mexico's Spanish legacy has informed the cultural traditions of one of the last states to join the union for more than four hundred years, or before the alluring capital of Santa Fe was founded in 1610. The fame the region gained from artist Georgia O'Keefe, writers Lew Wallace and D. H. Lawrence, and pistolero Billy the Kid has made New Mexico an international tourist destination.

The author is contacted by a supposed descendant of Hernán Cortés and La Malinche to review and transcribe a family document of great historical importance. Thus begins this captivating historical novel based on the memoirs of Martín Cortés, the Mestizo. Set in the magnificent Spanish Golden Age, Martín finds himself immersed in the court of King Carlos I and his heir, the future King Felipe II, participating in pivotal events that shaped both the newly founded Viceroyalty of New Spain and the European continent. Immerse yourself in this fascinating biographical story that unravels the...

The Spanish word cimarron, meaning "wild" or "untamed," refers to a region in the southern Rocky Mountains where control of timber, gold, coal, and grazing lands long bred violent struggle. After the United States occupation following the 1846-1848 war with Mexico, this tract of nearly two million acres came to be known as the Maxwell Land Grant. When Cimarron Meant Wild presents a new history of the collision that occurred over the region's resources between 1870 and 1900.

In the 1860s, Napoleon III, intent on curbing the rise of American imperialism, persuaded a young Austrian archduke and a Belgian princess to leave Europe and become the emperor and empress of Mexico. They and their entourage arrived in a Mexico ruled by terror, where revolutionary fervor was barely suppressed by French troops. When the United States, now clear of its own Civil War, aided the rebels in pushing back Maximilian’s imperial soldiers, the French army withdrew, abandoning the young couple. The regime fell apart.

The high desert of New Mexico was the crucible of the Atomic Age—a landscape of immense secrets and silent spaces. Here, humanity split the atom and stepped into a new era of power, fear, and secrecy. In the midst of this transformation, unexplained objects began to appear in the skies. This book presents a carefully researched history of the most enduring aerial mysteries of the American Southwest. Beginning with the legendary 1947 Roswell incident, it examines declassified documents, archival reports, and contemporary media coverage to trace how officials responded to unusual sightings....

When a cocksure father hatches a simple insurance fraud scheme, he has no idea its failure will lead his family into the maelstrom of America’s most violent prison riot. High Desert Blood takes you inside the walls of the Penitentiary of New Mexico, offering a gripping true crime journey through the heart of a system that failed its inmates, its staff, and the society it was meant to protect.

Greatest Mystery of the Southwest USAPerhaps the most fascinating chapter in Southwest history is the tale of the mysterious, “vanished” Anasazi Indians. Their tremendous achievements can be found in many places, including the spectacular cliff dwellings of Mesa Verde National Park. But the crest of the Anasazi wave was in Chaco Canyon, a shallow, windswept wash in northwest New Mexico. Here, 1,000 years ago, strange and unexplained events unfolded, events which continue to intrigue scientists and visitors today. In this book, you'll delve into the mystery: Why choose inhospitable Chaco...

Since the time of Columbus, Indian slavery was illegal in much of the American continent. Yet, as Andrés Reséndez illuminates in his myth-shattering The Other Slavery, it was practiced for centuries as an open secret. There was no abolitionist movement to protect the tens of thousands of natives who were kidnapped and enslaved by the conquistadors, then forced to descend into the "mouth of hell" of 18th-century silver mines or, later, made to serve as domestics for Mormon settlers and rich Anglos.

In Dreams of El Dorado, H. W. Brands tells the thrilling, panoramic story of the settling of the American West. He takes us from John Jacob Astor's fur trading outpost in Oregon to the Texas Revolution, from the California gold rush to the Oklahoma land rush. He shows how the migrants' dreams drove them to feats of courage and perseverance that put their stay-at-home cousins to shame - and how those same dreams also drove them to outrageous acts of violence against indigenous peoples and one another. El Dorado was at least as elusive in the West as it ever was in the East.

Empire of the Summer Moon spans two astonishing stories. The first traces the rise and fall of the Comanches, the most powerful Indian tribe in American history. The second entails one of the most remarkable narratives ever to come out of the Old West: the epic saga of the pioneer woman Cynthia Ann Parker and her mixed-blood son, Quanah, who became the last and greatest chief of the Comanches.

This fascinating journey through Mexico’s history, from its amazing pre-Hispanic past to the end of the 20th century, will reveal more surprises than the listener can imagine. In the words of the self-proclaimed Mexican singer Chavela Vargas, “Mexico has magic. I looked for that magic, and I found it there.”

He was once America’s ally. He became its most wanted man. In 1916, President Woodrow Wilson sent the U.S. Army into Mexico to hunt Pancho Villa—a rebel general, a folk hero, and now a bitter enemy. What followed was no simple manhunt, but a tangled campaign through brutal deserts, hostile villages, and the bloody aftershocks of the Mexican Revolution. Once Upon a Time in Mexico traces the path from revolutionary brotherhood to betrayal, through the eyes of those who lived it—including a young George S. Patton, who fired the first shot of his legendary military career on Mexican soil....

This classic in the field of ufology is filled with hard-hitting eyewitness testimony of one of the most important events of all time: the actual recovery of a UFO outside of Roswell, New Mexico, in 1947. For more than seventy years, government authorities have led us to believe the wreckage was merely a very conventional weather balloon - but the witnesses who were there continue to tell a different story. Witness to Roswell once again provides a "can't put down" written account of what really transpired in Roswell decades ago.

It was a moment unique in human history: the face-to-face meeting between two men from civilizations a world apart. In 1519, Hernán Cortés arrived on the shores of Mexico, determined not only to expand the Spanish empire but to convert the natives to Catholicism and carry off a fortune in gold. That he saw nothing paradoxical in his intentions is one of the most remarkable and tragic aspects of this unforgettable story.

The Aztec UFO Incident - the first ever widely publicized report of a recovered flying saucer - was derided as a hoax for decades. But now the Ramseys and Frank Thayer reveal the exact spot where the craft landed and show how the 100-foot-diameter saucer was moved to a secret laboratory. Witnesses to the incident who were interviewed by the authors affirm that they were sworn to secrecy by the military. The authors also reveal the names of scientists who worked on the craft after its recovery.