Acequia de Arriba

In the late 1700s, residents of the Villa de San Fernando petitioned the King of Spain for permission to dig an acequia, or irrigation ditch, to water land for a growing population. After years of opposition from the San Antonio de Valero missionaries, the King upheld the townspeople's viewpoint, and in 1778 they completed the Acequia de Arriba, which began just west of the San Antonio River and curved south and west to San Pedro Creek. The acequia helped the community flourish, and limestone ditch gates south of Hildebrand Avenue and the San Antonio Zoo's fish ponds remain as evidence of that agrarian era. Franciscan missionaries and early Spanish settlers excavated seven irrigation ditches along the San Antonio River and San Pedro Creek, carrying water to garden plots, farmlands, and each of the five missions, while shaping future settlement patterns and street alignments in San Antonio. The Zambrano/Rosengren House was built shortly after the acequia's completion, and in the 1900s artists and writers settled alongside the Acequia de Arriba. The River Road Country Day School was built in 1926, and Georgia O'Keeffe was among those who painted there. Sam Lucchese built a house in 1926 with a stage where his daughter Josephine, an internationally renowned opera singer, performed, and Potter Harding Black, Caroline Shelton, Lois Buckhalter, and Walter Starcke also lived in this scenic neighborhood.

San Antonio, Texas · United States