The Pueblo of Kuaua was inhabited from about 1300 to 1600. During the late 1930s, archaeologists unearthed approximately 1200 rooms of the village, while many more remained unexcavated. The walls in front are not original but were constructed in the 1940s to show the extent of the ancient pueblo. The excavations were undertaken in the 1930s as part of a plan to identify places where significant parts of New Mexico's history and prehistory could be interpreted and then excavated, preserved, and interpreted for visitors. By 1940, the Coronado State Monument visitor center and reconstructed ruin walls, using WPA labor, stood as a tribute to these efforts.