Albuquerque’s history dates back 12,000 years when the Anasazi Indians settled in the area. Living here for two centuries between the years 1000 to 1300, this inspiring group planted corn, beans and squash and constructed adobe and brick pit homes along the banks of the Rio Grande. Further, they established several communities throughout northeastern New Mexico, connecting them with sophisticated roads.

Then, in 1540, Conquistador Francisco Vasquez de Coronado came north in search of the mythical Seven Cities of Cibola. Though Coronado left empty handed, it didn’t stop even more Spanish settlers arriving in the area, looking for the elusive gold. The Pueblo Rebellion of 1680 discouraged further settlement until Spanish General Don Diego de Vargas arrived in 1692. By the end of the 16th century, several trading posts were established just north of the present day city.

By the beginning of the 17^th century, the area that would one day become Albuquerque was called Bosque Grande de San Francisco Xavier. In 1706, the ambitious provisional governor of the territory, Don Francisco Cuervo y Valdez, petitioned the Spanish government for permission to establish the bosque as a formal villa and call it Alburquerque, after Viceroy Francisco Fernandez de la Cueva, the Duke of Alburquerque. Later the spelling was changed because some influential person couldn't pronounce the "R" in Alburquerque. The city is still nicknamed “Duke City.”

During much of the 18th and 19th century, Albuquerque was little more than a dusty trading center along the El Camino Real, the trail linking Mexico and Santa Fe. Close-knit families of Spanish descent accounted for most of the population living around the central plaza, in what is now Old Town.

This began to change when Josiah Gregg, a frontiersman and trailblazer established the Old Fort Smith Wagon Road between Arkansas and Santa Fe in 1839. For ten years, few people cared little about the trail until the California Gold Rush of 1849, when it became heavily traveled by those pioneers seeking their fortunes in the far west.

In 1846, the United States claimed the territory when General Stephen Kearny established an army post. During the Civil War, Confederate troops briefly occupied Albuquerque, but once the war was over, white merchants and tradesmen began to arrive in numbers.

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