Paisano Pass
Marfa vicinity, Presidio County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Legend recounts that two Spaniards meeting here greeted each other "Mi Paisano" (My Countryman). First known to history when Juan Dominguez de Mendoza camped here on January 3, 1684. Well known after 1850 as a point on the Chihuahua Trail, an emigrant road to California.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
According to legend, this mountain pass took its name from two Spaniards who met and greeted each other "Mi Paisano"—my countryman. It first entered the historical record when Juan Dominguez de Mendoza camped here in January 1684, and after 1850 it became a well-known point on the Chihuahua Trail, an emigrant road carrying travelers toward California. The pass links Spanish exploration to the great mid-century westward migrations.
Why it matters
Paisano Pass marks a corridor of movement across the Texas mountains, from Spanish expeditions to the California-bound emigrant trails of the 1850s.
Own a business near here? Add it to the map.
Related people
- · Juan Dominguez de Mendoza
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Ritchey Hotel, 1886
Alpine, TX
Built in 1886 of frame and adobe, the Ritchey Hotel rose beside the cattle-loading pens of the Southern Pacific Railway in the vast, remote Big Bend country. Here cowhands and ranchers who had driven stock in from scattered ranches could find a bed, a drink, and company while waiting to ship their cattle east by rail. It captures the moment when the railroad transformed West Texas ranching from an isolated frontier trade into part of a national market.
San Antonio-El Paso Road
Fort Davis, TX
Blazed by westward expeditions in the late 1840s, the San Antonio–El Paso Road split into upper and lower routes that rejoined at the Pecos to cross the Davis Mountains. Couriers like Henry Skillman and George Giddings ran mail and relay stations along it, Fort Davis guarded it, and by 1867 troopers of the 9th U.S. Cavalry patrolled a route traveled under army escort until railroads made it obsolete in the 1880s.
Prude Ranch
Fort Davis, TX
Andrew Prude bought his first sections of land in the cool, high country near Fort Davis in 1897 and steadily built his holdings into a sprawling 40-section cattle ranch, capped by a two-story adobe "Big House" in 1911. In 1921 the family began taking in city guests arriving by the Southern Pacific Railroad, and when drought and the Depression forced the sale of their cattle, they turned the guest ranch into their livelihood — adding cabins, a rodeo, and youth camps that keep the place a West Texas destination today.
Site of Alamito
Marfa vicinity, TX
Alamito Creek had been a corridor of human activity since prehistoric times when Spanish explorers first passed through in 1535 and Mexican families began raising rancheros here around 1715 despite Apache pressure. In the 1850s the storied Chihuahua Trail brought freight wagons rumbling past, and by 1870 Alamito was a farming community led by North Carolina pioneer John Davis, who married into the founding Herrera family and served peach brandy to travelers. A railroad reached the site in 1930 and renamed it Plata, but today only ruins of the homes, chapel, school, and canal remain, with wagon ruts still cut into the bedrock.