In the 1700s and early 1800s, only a trickle of travelers came by the Casa Grande. Spanish explorers and then Mexican and American travelers wondered who built the ruin and why. More people visited after 1879, when the railroad first reached the town of Casa Grande 19 miles away. Travelers scratched their names into the walls, and some took away artifacts, even pieces of the walls, as souvenirs. In 1889, Congress voted to protect Casa Grande Ruins from further vandalism and looting and to pay for clearing away debris and repairing the eroded foundation. The wooden beams and metal rods seen today were installed in 1891 to brace some of the walls. Three years later, the federal government made Casa Grande the nation's first archaeological preserve. Eusebio Francisco Kino, a Jesuit missionary, explorer, and mapmaker, was the first European to see and document these ruins in 1694, and Father Kino called the building Casa Grande, Spanish for great house.