One Of a Kind

Clovis Man inhabited the Blackwater Draw area north of Portales until 11,000 years ago. Seminomadic non-Pueblo Southern Athabaskan groups ( Apache, Navajo) occupied much of the area as early as the 13th century. In the early 18th century, the Comanche displaced the Apache, who had previously lived in this region. The Comanche commanded the area until late in the 19th century. The surrounding area of eastern New Mexico is part of what came to be known in the colonial period during Spanish rule as the " Llano Estacado", an arid and treeless plateau bounded on the north and west by the Caprock Escarpment stretching south from the Canadian River and east along the Pecos River.