Crossroads Through Time

For many thousands of years, this crossroads has been part of layered networks connecting generations. It has been a place of ancient farming, where the river provided dependable water and stable soil for planting, a place of gathering with an important ancestral Pueblo ceremonial center, and a place of travel and trade with flat paths through the rough surrounding barriers. In 1829, 60 traders and 100 mules camped near this crossing on the Old Spanish Trail after passing through Largo Canyon and before heading toward La Plata, with the Animas River crossing serving as a convenient midpoint. In 1905, the Denver & Rio Grande Western built a railroad line along the Animas River to carry the region's agricultural products to Durango and beyond. With the rise of automobiles, paved roads followed, and US 550 came through Aztec in the late 1920s. The ancestral Pueblo had also built exceptionally straight roads linking ceremonial centers of the Chacoan world, and this place lies within feet of that 900-year-old Chaco North Road.

Aztec, New Mexico · United States