Española, First European Capital

The small city of Española sits near the confluence of the Rio Chama and the Rio Grande, and this is not an accidental location. In fifteen ninety-eight, Spanish colonizer Juan de Oñate established the first European capital of New Mexico just north of here, at the Tewa Pueblo of Ohkay Owingeh. He called it San Juan de los Caballeros.

When that arrangement proved awkward, the Spanish had simply moved into the existing pueblo, Oñate shifted his capital across the river to a new settlement he named San Gabriel, near present-day Española. San Gabriel became the seat of colonial government for the region, making this area the site of the first European capital in what is now the United States, predating both Jamestown and Santa Fe. Española itself was formally established when the railroad arrived in the eighteen eighties, becoming a hub for the surrounding communities of the Española Valley.