El Paso: A Borderlands History

This study accepts this concept of Borderlands: an area that lies astride the United States-Mexican boundary, comprising the six northern Mexican states and the four states that make up the American Southwest.El Paso's four hundred years of history begins with the arrival of the first Spanish expedition from the south in 1581. As they approached the Rio Grande, the Spanish saw two mountain ranges rising out of the desert with a deep chasm between. This site they names El Paso del Norte, the future location of two border cities - Ciudad Juares on the south bank, and El Paso, Texas, on the opposite side of the river.